It might even explain, too, why "Monsieur" expects to make so long a stay here to get things all straightened out. Oh, I'm so glad I thought of this! I can hardly wait for to-morrow to come, so that I can tell Carol. And I believe I'll even tell the Imp, too. She's been so decent to me of late that I'm willing to do 'most anything for her.
"Ahoy, girls! Come over and see the big smash!"
It was the Imp who thus hailed the two girls as they were coming home from the village one Saturday afternoon early in March. She was one of a group that was standing in Louis's front yard, and the girls hurried over to see what it was all about. They found that a fine old cherry-tree had been half blown over by a high wind the night before, and now it threatened to fall at the slightest jar. Its fall would do serious damage to the fence near which it stood. Louis had decided to chop it down so that it would fall in the opposite direction. It was not the first time that he had had the experience, and he rather enjoyed the thought of the task before him. It was quite evident, however, that "Monsieur" did not at all approve of this scheme. He paced back and forth on the path, muttering impatiently to himself in French and occasionally urging Louis to be extremely careful.
As this was the first time that either Sue or Carol had met "Monsieur," Louis stopped long enough to make the introductions. Monsieur bowed formally and murmured that he was "charmed to meet mesdemoiselles," but there his interest in them ended, and he continued to pace back and forth and mutter to himself.
Once the Imp poked Sue and whispered:
"He says, 'Always, always this servant's work!' He's been having a fit about this ever since they came out. But Louis was determined to get it done. Monsieur certainly does make him mad and nervous, though."
The tree was almost ready to topple over, when an unfortunate thing happened. It may have been that Louis was nervous, or that his foot slipped on a patch of ice, or that it was a combination of both. At any rate, just as the ax was raised for one of his most telling blows, he missed his aim and brought it down directly on his left foot. With a slight groan, he dropped to the ground. An instant later blood began to pour from the wound in sickening spurts. So sudden had it all been, that his watchers hardly realized what had happened till the spouting blood revealed the accident.
Immediately all was confusion. Monsieur uttered a cry that was almost a scream and, stooping down, tried to lift Louis in his arms. Miss Yvonne rushed out, wringing her hands and screaming, too, in her excitable French fashion. Old Mr. Meadows raised the parlor-window and stood calling out all sorts of impossible directions, half in French and half in English. Carol turned as white as a sheet and looked as if she were going to faint away. She usually did at the sight of blood. Only the Imp seemed to have any sense left. She called out to Carol:
"You run to our house and telephone for any doctor you can get, either in the village or at Bridgeton!"
Then she said to Monsieur: