"There are so many English at the plage," she complained, "that I know you will talk with them; and it is a pity to come to France to learn the language and waste your time talking with English, whom you can meet in your own country."
"But I won't talk with them," Barbara had assured her. "You know how careful I have been always to speak French—even when I could hardly make myself understood."
The girl's eyes twinkled, for Mademoiselle Thérèse had a mania for speaking English whenever possible, and at first always used that language when with her pupil, until Barbara had asked her if she had got so accustomed to speaking English that it was more familiar to her than French! Since then, she only used English in public places, or when she thought English people were near.
"It is such a good advertisement," she explained complacently. "You never know what introductions it may make for you."
Barbara had used the same argument in favour of bathing every day, and had prevailed, though she had really been very particular about speaking French—not, I fear, from the desire of pleasing Mademoiselle Thérèse, but because of the thought of the home people, and what she meant to do for them.
"I can't understand how you can bear riding in this weather," Marie remarked, as they toiled slowly home in the sun. "It would kill me to jog up and down on a horse in a sun as hot as this."
"Not when you're accustomed to it," Barbara assured her. "You would want to do it everyday then. I'm going to ride to St. Lunaire this afternoon."
"Then Aunt Thérèse won't go for the walk after supper. What a happiness!" Marie cried, for Mademoiselle Loiré was not so strict as her sister.
The latter had grown quite reconciled to her journeys to Dinard now, and, as a matter of fact, was looking forward with regret to the time they must cease. She found the afternoons in the Casino Gardens with her friend very pleasant, and came back each time full of ideas for altering everybody's clothes.
This she was not permitted to do, however, for Mademoiselle Loiré had an unpleasant remembrance of similar plans on a previous occasion, which had resulted in many garments being unpicked, and then left in a dismembered condition until Marie and she had laboriously sewed them up again! This particular afternoon Mademoiselle Thérèse was in a very complacent mood, having just retrimmed her hat for the second time since its immersion, and feeling that it was wonderfully successful.