Rose A Charlitte Part 21

"I never saw you so interested in a place," she observed, with a fretful side glance. "The travelling agents and loquacious peasants never seem to bore you."

"But I do not talk to the agents, and I do not find the others loquacious; neither would I call them peasants."

"It doesn't matter what you call them. They are all beneath you."

Vesper looked meditatively across the Bay at a zigzag, woolly trail of smoke made by a steamer that was going back and forth in a distressed way, as if unable to find the narrow pa.s.sage that led to the Bay of Fundy.

"The Checkertons have gone to the White Mountains," said Mrs. Nimmo, in a vexed tone, as if the thought gave her no pleasure. "I should like to join them there."

"Very well, we can leave here to-morrow."

Her face brightened. "But your business?"

"I can send some one to look after it, or Agapit would attend to it."

"And you would not need to come back?"

"Not necessarily. I might do so, however."

"In the event of some of the LeNoirs being found?"

"In the event of my not being able to exist without--the Bay."

"Give me the Charles River," said Mrs. Nimmo, hastily. "It is worth fifty Bays."

"To me also," said Vesper; "but there is one family here that I should like to transplant to the banks of the Charles."

Mrs. Nimmo did not speak until they had pa.s.sed through long Comeauville and longer Saulnierville, and were entering peaceful Meteghan River with its quietly flowing stream and gra.s.sy meadows. Then having partly subdued the first shock of having a horror of such magnitude presented to her, she murmured, "Are you sure that you know your own mind?"

"Quite sure, mother," he said, earnestly and affectionately; "but now, as always, my first duty is to you."

Tears sprang to her eyes, and ran quietly down her cheeks. "When you lay ill," she said, in a repressed voice, "I sat by you. I prayed to G.o.d to spare your life. I vowed that I would do anything to please you, yet, now that you are well, I cannot bear the idea of giving you up to another woman."

Vesper looked over his shoulder, then guided Toochune up by one of the gay gardens before the never-ending row of houses in order to allow a hay-wagon to pa.s.s them. When they were again in the middle of the road, he said, "I, too, had serious thoughts when I was ill, but you know how difficult it is for me to speak of the things nearest my heart."

"I know that you are a good son," she said, pa.s.sionately. "You would give up the woman of your choice for my sake, but I would not allow it, for it would make you hate me,--I have seen so much trouble in families where mothers have opposed their sons' marriages. It does no good, and then--I do not want you to be a lonely old man when I'm gone."

"Mother," he said, protestingly.

"How did it happen?" she asked, suddenly composing herself, and dabbing at her face with her handkerchief.

Vesper's face grew pale, and, after a short hesitation, he said, dreamily, "I scarcely know. She has become mixed up with my life in an imperceptible way, and there is an inexpressible something about her that I have never found in any other woman."

Mrs. Nimmo struggled with a dozen conflicting thoughts. Then she sighed, miserably, "Have you asked her to marry you?"

"No."

"But you will?"

"I do not know," he said, reluctantly. "I have nothing planned. I wish to tell you, to save misunderstandings."

"She has some crotchet against marriage,--she told me so this morning.

Do you know what it is?"

"I can guess."

Mrs. Nimmo pondered a minute. "She has fallen in love with you," she said at last, "and because she thinks you will not marry her, she will have no other man."

"I think you scarcely understand her. She does not understand herself."

Mrs. Nimmo uttered a soft, "Nonsense!" under her breath.

"Suppose we drop the matter for a time," said Vesper, in acute sensitiveness. "It is in an incipient state as yet."

"I know you better than to suppose that it will remain incipient," said his mother, despairingly. "You never give anything up. But, as you say, we had better not talk any more about it. It has given me a terrible shock, and I will need time to get over it,--I thank you for telling me, however," and she silently directed her attention to the distant red cathedral spire, and the white houses of Meteghan,--the place where the picnic was being held.

They caught up with the big wagon just before it reached a large brown building, surrounded by a garden and pleasure-grounds, and situated some distance from the road. This was the convent, and Vesper knew that, within its quiet walls, Rose had received the education that had added to her native grace the gentle _savoir faire_ that reminded him of convent-bred girls that he had met abroad, and that made her seem more like the denizen of a city than the mistress of a little country inn.

In front of the convent the road was almost blocked by vehicles. Rows of horses stood with their heads tied to its garden fence, and bicycles by the dozen were ranged in the shadow of its big trees. Across the road from it a green field had been surrounded by a hedge of young spruce trees, and from this enclosure sounds of music and merrymaking could be heard. A continual stream of people kept pouring in at the entrance-gate, without, however, making much diminution in the crowd outside.

Agapit requested his pa.s.sengers to alight, then, accompanied by one of the young men of his party, who took charge of Vesper's horse, he drove to a near stable. Five minutes later he returned, and found his companions drawn up together watching Acadien boys and girls flock into the saloon of a travelling photographer.

"There is now no time for picture-taking," he vociferated; "come, let us enter. See, I have tickets," and he proudly marshalled his small army up to the gate, and entered the picnic grounds at their head.

They found Vesper and his mother inside. This ecclesiastical fair going on under the convent walls, and almost in the shadow of the red cathedral, reminded them of the fairs of history. Here, as there, no policemen were needed among the throngs of buyers and sellers, who strolled around and around the gra.s.sy enclosure, and examined the wares exhibited in verdant booths. Good order was ensured by the presence of several priests, who were greeted with courtesy and reverence by all.

Agapit, who was a devout Catholic, stood with his hat in his hand until his own parish priest had pa.s.sed; then his eyes fell on the essentially modern and central object in the fair grounds,--a huge merry-go-round from Boston, with brightly painted blue seats, to which a load of Acadien children clung in an ecstasy of delight, as they felt themselves being madly whirled through the air.

"Let us all ride!" he exclaimed. "Come, showman, give us the next turn."

The wheezing, panting engine stopped, and they all mounted, even Madame Pitre, who shivered with delicious apprehension, and Mrs. Nimmo, who whispered in her son's ear, "I never did such a thing before, but in Acadie one must do as the Acadiens do."

Vesper sat down beside her, and took the slightly dubious Narcisse on his knee, holding him closely when an expression of fear flitted over his delicate features, and encouraging him to sit upright when at last he became more bold.

"Another turn," shouted Agapit, when the music ceased, and they were again stationary. The whistle blew, and they all set out again; but no one wished to attempt a third round, and, giddily stumbling over each other, they dismounted and with laughing remarks wandered to another part of the grounds, where dancing was going on in two spruce arbors.

"It is necessary for all to join," he proclaimed, at the top of his voice, but his best persuasions failed to induce either Rose or Vesper to step into the arbors, where two young Acadiens sat perched up in two corners, and gleefully tuned their fiddles.

"She will not dance, because she wishes to make herself singular,"

reflected Mrs. Nimmo, bitterly, and Vesper, who felt the unspoken thought as keenly as if it had been uttered, moved a step nearer Rose, who modestly stood apart from them.

Agapit flung down his money,--ten cents apiece for each dance,--and, ordering his a.s.sociates to choose their partners, signed to the fiddlers to begin.

Mrs. Nimmo forgot Rose for a time, as she watched the dancers. The girls were shy and demure; the young men danced l.u.s.tily, and with great spirit, emphasizing the first note of each bar by a stamp on the floor, and beating a kind of tattoo with one foot, when not taking part in the quadrille.

"Do you have only square dances?" she asked Madame Pitre, when a second and a third quadrille were succeeded by a fourth.

"Yes," said the Acadienne, gravely. "There is no sin in a quadrille.

There is in a waltz."