Rose promised. And now they were to go down the river.
"The courage, of course," and Madame glanced up smilingly. "We take the child for the present."
"I shall soon be jealous, ma mie, but it is a pleasure to see a bright young thing about that can talk with her eyes and not chatter shrilly. Mon dieu! what voices most of the wives have, and they are transmitting them to their children. Yes; we will start at noon, and be gone two days. Destournier has some messages to deliver. Put on thy plainest frock, we are not in sunny France now."
She had learned that and only dressed up now and then for her husband's sake, or to please the child. And she had made her some pretty frocks out of petticoats quite too fine for wear here.
Rose was overjoyed. Wanamee was to accompany them. When they were ready they were piloted down to the wharf by Monsieur, and there was M. Ralph to welcome them. The river was brisk with boats and canoes and shallops. The sun glistened on the naked backs of Indian rowers bending with every stroke of the paddles to a rhythmic sort of sound, that later on grew to be regular songs. There were squaws handling canoes with grace and dexterity. One would have considered Quebec a great entrepôt.
But the river with its beautiful bank, its groves of trees that had not yet been despoiled, its frowning rocks glinting in the sunshine, its wild flowers, its swift dazzle of birds, its great flocks of geese, snowy white, in the little coves that uttered shrill cries and then huddled together, the islands that reared grassy heads a moment and were submerged as the current swept over them.
"Why are they not drowned?" asked Rose. "Or can they swim like the little Indian boys?"
M. Giffard laughed—he often did at her quaint questions.
"They are like the trees; they have taken root ever so far down, and the tide cannot sweep them away."
"And is Quebec rooted that way? Do the rocks hold fast? And—all the places, even France?"