Michelle needed no second warning, but, proving equal to the occasion, re-entered the shop, where she was well known, and where she held a brief consultation with the shopkeeper, which resulted in the conducting of the two through a back way into one of the riverside streets, where numerous inns and drinking-places stood to the right and left. Here sailors rolled jauntily along, and here wonderful old houses, each story overlapping the one below, loomed up over the heads of the passers-by. A few steps away was the Rue Harenguerie, and here in the midst of the cries and chatterings of the fish-wives it was easy to lose one’s self. Across on the opposite bank was the favorite promenade of the ladies of the town. Alaine had often been there with her aunt among the careless pleasure-seekers, but now she watched anxiously the stolid countenance of Michelle, who elbowed her way through the market, and at last stopped upon its outskirts, where, after some chaffering with a sharp-eyed man, she appeared satisfied, and turned with a smile to her charge.
“Here we go,” she said. “Yonder is the cart which will take us in the direction of Dieppe; but, alas! my little one, you have been looked upon too suspiciously; yours is no peasant face, and despite your dress you may be detected, for I gather enough to know that it is going to be no easy task to get away safely. However, if you can be content with a bed of cabbages and a coverlet of carrots you shall be transported without harm. As for me, I am weather-beaten enough to pass easily, yet we must wait till evening before we start. Meantime, under yonder cart is your refuge, and I will stay here pretending to sell fish.”
In the dimness of twilight Alaine was established uncomfortably enough on her bed of cabbages, and over her were lightly piled some overturned baskets which were to hide her from view. She could breathe easily and could move slightly, but the journey was long, and more than once there were moments of terror when the cart was stopped and the driver questioned. Michelle, however, was always equal to the occasion, and by daybreak the small fishing village toward which their faces were set was in sight, and by high noon the refugees were on their way to England.
CHAPTER II
THE FEAST OF THE FAT CALF
In the little village of New Rochelle there was a great jollification on a day in June which marks the feast of John the Baptist. From one of the houses erected on the side of the high street could be heard a voice singing clearly the Huguenot battle psalm,—
“Oh, Lord, thou didst us clean forsake
And scatter all abroad,”—
and from a doorway a girl’s face peeped out. “They are making ready, Mère Michelle,” she cried, stopping her song. “Hurry with the loaves, I see Gerard coming now; the men are gathering from every direction. Hola, Gerard, is it a very fat calf?” she cried to the young man, who waved his cap to her as he approached.
“A lusty young creature, indeed,” he replied, as he came near. “Are the loaves ready?”
“Mère Michelle is but now placing them in the baskets. It will be a fine day for the feast, Gerard. Some one said there were new-comers in the village to swell the crowd.”