Part 41 (1/2)

Bidiane glanced at the cool white cottage against its green background.

”Why, it is like a tiny Grand Trianon!”

”An' what's that?”

”It is a villa near Paris, a very fine one, built in the form of a horseshoe.”

”Yes,--that's what we call it,” interrupted her aunt. ”We ain't blind.

We say the horseshoe cottage.”

”One of the kings of France had the Grand Trianon built for a woman he loved,” said Bidiane, reverently. ”I think Mr. Nimmo must have sent the plan for this from Paris,--but he never spoke to me about it.”

”He is not a man who tells all,” said Claudine, in French.

Bidiane and Mirabelle Marie had been speaking English, but they now reverted to their own language.

”When do you have lunch?” asked Bidiane.

”Lunch,--what's that?” asked her aunt. ”We have dinner soon.”

”And I must descend,” said Claudine, hurrying down-stairs. ”I smell something burning.”

Bidiane was about to follow her, when there was a clattering heard on the stairway.

”It's the young ones,” cried Mirabelle Marie, joyfully. ”Some fool has told 'em. They'll wring your neck like the blowpipe of a chicken.”

The next minute two noisy, rough, yet slightly shy boys had taken possession of their returned cousin and were leading her about the inn in triumph.

Mirabelle Marie tried to keep up with them, but could not succeed in doing so. She was too excited to keep still, too happy to work, so she kept on waddling from one room to another, to the stable, the garden, and even to the corner,--to every spot where she could catch a glimpse of the tail of Bidiane's gown, or the heels of her twinkling shoes. The girl was indefatigable; she wished to see everything at once. She would wear herself out.

Two hours after lunch she announced her determination to call on Rose.

”I'll skip along, too,” said her aunt, promptly.

”I wish to be quite alone when I first see this wonderful woman,” said Bidiane.

”But why is she wonderful?” asked Mirabelle Marie.

Bidiane did not hear her. She had flitted out to the veranda, wrapping a scarf around her shoulders as she went. While her aunt stood gazing longingly after her, she tripped up the village street, enjoying immensely the impression she created among the women and children, who ran to the doorways and windows to see her pa.s.s.

There were no houses along the cutting in the hill through which the road led to the sullen stream of Sleeping Water. Rose's house stood quite alone, and at some distance from the street, its gleaming, freshly painted front towards the river, its curved back against a row of pine-trees.

It was very quiet. There was not a creature stirring, and the warm July suns.h.i.+ne lay languidly on some deserted chairs about a table on the lawn.

Bidiane went slowly up to the hall door and rang the bell.

Rosy-cheeked Celina soon stood before her; and smiling a welcome, for she knew very well who the visitor was, she gently opened the door of a long, narrow blue and white room on the right side of the hall.

Bidiane paused on the threshold. This dainty, exquisite apartment, furnished so simply, and yet so elegantly, had not been planned by an architect or furnished by a decorator of the Bay. This bric-a-brac, too, was not Acadien, but Parisian. Ah, how much Mr. Nimmo loved Rose a Charlitte! and she drew a long breath and gazed with girlish and fascinated awe at the tall, beautiful woman who rose from a low seat, and slowly approached her.

Rose was about to address her, but Bidiane put up a protesting hand.