Keith was stiff for a week after his race on the hand-car, but did his
groaning in private. He knew what a commotion would be raised if the
matter came to his grandmother's ears. She had lived all winter in
constant dread of accidents. Malcolm had been carried home twice in an
unconscious state, once from having been thrown from his bicycle, and
once from falling through a trap-door in the barn. Keith had broken
through the ice on the pond, sprained his wrist while coasting, and
walked in half a dozen times with the blood streaming from some wound on
his head or face.
Virginia had never been hurt, but her hair-breadth escapes would have
filled a volume. An amusing one was the time she lassoed a young calf,
Indian fashion, to show the boys how it should be done. Its angry
mother was in the next lot, but Virginia felt perfectly safe as she
swung her lariat and dragged the bleating calf around the barn-yard. She
did not stop to consider that if a cow with lofty ambitions had once
jumped over the moon, one which saw its calf in danger might easily leap
a low hedge. Malcolm's warning shout came just in time to save her from
being gored by the angry animal, who charged at her with lowered horns.
She sprang up the ladder leading to the corn-crib window, where she was
safe, but she had to hang there until Unc' Henry could be called to
the rescue.
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