Part 46 (1/2)

Suddenly the girl's voice ceased; in the twinkling of an eye there had been a rip, a sudden evacuation of air from one of the rubber tubes on her wheel, and she had sprung to the road.

”Good afternoon,” said Agapit, driving up, ”you have punctured a tire.”

”Yes,” she replied, in dismay, ”the wretched thing! If I knew which wicked stone it was that did it, I would throw it into the Bay.”

”What will you do?”

”Oh, I do not know. I wish I had leather tires.”

”I will take you to Sleeping Water, mademoiselle, if you wish.”

”But I do not care to cause you that trouble,” and she gazed mischievously and longingly up and down the road.

”It will not be a trouble,” he said, gravely.

”Anything is a trouble that one does not enjoy.”

”But there is duty, mademoiselle.”

”Ah, yes, duty, dear duty,” she said, making a face. ”I have been instructed to love it, therefore I accept your offer. How fortunate for me that you happened to be driving by! Almost every one is haying. What shall we do with the wheel?”

”We can perhaps lash it on behind. I have some rope. No, it is too large. Well, we can at least wheel it to the post-office in Belliveau's Cove,--or stay, give me your wrench. I will take off the wheel, carry it to Meteghan River, and have it mended. I am going to Cheticamp to-night. To-morrow I will call for it and bring it to you.”

”Oh, you are good,--I did not know that there is a repair shop at Meteghan River.”

”There is,--they even make wheels.”

”But the outside world does not know that. The train conductor told that if anything went wrong with my bicycle, I would have to send it to Yarmouth.”

”The outside world does not know of many things that exist in Clare.

Will you get into the buggy, mademoiselle? I will attend to this.”

Bidiane meekly ensconced herself under the hood, and took the reins in her hands. ”What are you going to do with the remains?” she asked, when Agapit put the injured wheel in beside her.

”We might leave them at Madame LeBlanc's,” and he pointed to a white house in the distance. ”She will send them to you by some pa.s.sing cart.”

”That is a good plan,--she is quite a friend of mine.”

”I will go on foot, if you will drive my horse.”

They at once set out, Bidiane driving, and Agapit walking silently along the gra.s.sy path at the side of the road.

The day was tranquil, charming, and a perfect specimen of ”the divine weather” that Saint-Mary's Bay is said to enjoy in summer. Earlier in the afternoon there had been a soft roll of pearl gray fog on the Bay, in and out of which the schooners had been slipping like phantom s.h.i.+ps.

Now it had cleared away, and the long blue sweep of water was open to them. They could plainly see the opposite sh.o.r.es of long Digby Neck,--each fisherman's cottage, each comfortable farmhouse, each bit of forest sloping to the water's edge. Over these hills hung the sun, hot and glowing, as a sun should be in haying time. On Digby Neck the people were probably making hay. Here about them there had been a general desertion of the houses for work in the fields. Men, women, and children were up on the slopes on their left, and down on the banks on their right, the women's cotton dresses s.h.i.+ning in gay spots of color against the green foliage of the evergreen and hardwood trees that grew singly or in groups about the extensive fields of gra.s.s.

Madame LeBlanc was not at home, so Agapit pinned a note to the bicycle, and left it standing outside her front gate with the comfortable a.s.surance that, although it might be the object of curious glances, no one would touch it until the return of the mistress of the house.

Then he entered the buggy, and, with one glance into Bidiane's eyes, which were dancing with merriment, he took the reins from her and drove on briskly.

She stared at the magnificent panorama of purple hills and s.h.i.+ning water spread out before them, and, remembering the company that she was in, tried to concentrate her attention on the tragic history of her countrymen. Her most earnest effort was in vain; she could not do so, and she endeavored to get further back, and con over the romantic exploits of Champlain and De Monts, whose oddly shaped s.h.i.+ps had ploughed these waters; but here again she failed. Her mind came back, always irresistibly back, from the ancient past to the man of modern times seated beside her.