What I thought I saw move appeared to be a dry lily
bloom of an orange-red colour, that had fallen and lodged on the
grasses against a stalk.
"It's only a dead lily," I said; "drive on."
"Is there a moth that colour?" asked Molly-Cotton.
"Yes," I replied. "There is an orange-brown species, but it is
rare. I never have seen a living one."
So we passed the lilies. A very peculiar thing is that when one
grows intensely interested in a subject, and works over it, a
sort of instinct, an extra sense as it were, is acquired. Three
rods away, I became certain I had seen something move, so strongly
the conviction swept over me that we had passed a moth. Still, it
was raining, and the ditch was wet and deep.
"I am sorry we did not stop," I said, half to myself, "I can't help
feeling that was a moth."
There is where youth, in all its impetuosity, helped me. If the
girl had asked, "Shall I go back?" in all probability I would
have answered, "No, I must have been mistaken. Drive on!"
Instead, Molly-Cotton, who had straightened herself, and touched up
her horse for a brisk entrance into town, said, "Well, we will just
settle that 'feeling' right here!"
At a trot, she deftly cut a curve in the broad road and drove
back.
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