“We shall have no milk to-night,” he told her, “yet she becomes better, and I think to-morrow will see her safe, so we can start betimes.”
Alaine with gentle hand stroked the soft ears of the cow, which eagerly drank from the trough and was led back to the barn; then the girl filled her tankard and bore it indoors.
“I must go to see Alexandre Allaire,” said Papa Louis when the simple meal was over. “I shall have to leave you alone here for a short time, my daughter, but there is nothing to fear. I greatly desire to know where we stand in the matter of a new church; a deep longing for it takes possession of us all, and I trust the day is not distant when we can rear the walls of a new temple here in the wilderness.”
By the time he had disappeared behind the leafy trees just beyond the newly set out orchard Alaine had cleared away the supper dishes and ran out for a last look at her fowls. They must be well secured, and there was no Michelle there to spy out a possible loophole where wild creatures could make an entrance. Assuring herself that all was safe, she returned to the house. As she entered the sitting-room, by the dim light she saw sitting a figure bending over the little table.
“Ah, mademoiselle, I am indeed fortunate,” said François Dupont, who put down the book he had been holding and advanced to meet her. “I feared you might have gone with the others upon the long journey to Manhatte, yet I did not see you among the train as they passed, and, therefore, I ventured here in hopes of finding you.”
Alaine retreated a step. What ill fate had given her an interview with this man whom she had hoped never to see again?
“And I was fortunate,” he repeated, “Mademoiselle—Hervieu.”
Alaine started, but recovered herself to say, steadily, “My father, M. Louis Mercier, will be here in a moment to welcome you, monsieur. I regret that Madame Mercier, my mother, is not here to entertain you.”
M. Dupont looked at her with a half-smile curling his lips. “All of which sounds very well, mademoiselle, but does not alter the fact that Mademoiselle Hervieu, herself, does not seem over-glad to meet an old acquaintance.”
“An old acquaintance? An exceedingly short acquaintance. It was at the Feast of the Fat Calf that I met you, and since then not at all.”