“Thank you;—no.”
Paul gave her a look. She fancied that she saw in it regret. “Is it very curious—your village? Perhaps it would be amusing, after all.”
He helped her into the canoe, and the next moment they were gliding up the lake. The village was a temporary one, twenty or thirty wigwams in a grove. Only the women and children were at home, the sweet-voiced young squaws in their calico skirts and blankets, the queer little mummy-like pappooses, the half-naked children. They brought out bows and arrows to sell, agates which they had found on the beach, Indian sugar in little birch-bark boxes, quaintly ornamented.
“Tell them to gather some bluebells for me,” said Eve. Her face had an expression of joyousness; every now and then she laughed like a merry girl.
Paul repeated her request in the Chippewa tongue, and immediately all the black-eyed children sallied forth, returning with large bunches of the fragile-stemmed flowers, so that Eve’s hands were full. She lingered, sitting on the side of an old canoe; she distributed all the small coins she had. Finally they were afloat again; she wondered who had suggested it. “There’s a gleam already,” she said, as they passed Jupiter Light. “Some day I should like to go out there.”
“I can take you now,” Paul answered. And he sent the canoe flying towards the reef.
She had made no protest. “He wished to go,” she said to herself, contentedly.
The distance was greater than she had supposed; it was twilight when they reached the miniature beach.
“Shall we make them let us in, and climb up to the top?” suggested Paul.
She laughed. “No; better not.”