“Then you know it. You have been here before.”
“Oh, yes, several times. That is why I could conduct you, because I knew the way.”
Lucie stood still and lifted her face to the sky. “How lovely it all is; those floating fleecy clouds, this sweet-smelling air, the birds, the trees. We shall be much happier here; I am sure of it, aren’t you, Paulette?”
“It is what I have desired, to go to the country,” she replied. “Let us get on, my child.”
So they traveled on. At the top of the hill Victor pointed out a low, long white house set in an orchard, and surrounded by smaller buildings. “That is where we go,” Victor told the others.
“I hope they want us,” said Lucie. “It seems strange to be going to people I never saw before, and whom I know nothing at all about. It is very good of them to take us in.”
“They will be glad enough to have helpers in the fields, you may be sure of that.”
“But I shall not be that exactly, shall I?”
“Well, no; you will be a guest, rather more like a guest.”
“But papa pays for me?”