“I’m so glad we aren’t automobiling this time!” sighed Babbie. “James wouldn’t have let us come here. He’d have fussed about the roads or the garages or something of that sort. I hope we shall have time for some more little out-of-the-way villages.”
“There are dozens in this neighborhood,” the “man from Cook’s” assured her. “We ought to be energetic and take some side-trips. We can go to Dinard——”
“That’s where I want to go,” broke in Mrs. Hildreth. “I’ve heard so much about what a gay, pretty little place it is. Is it hard to get there, Madeline?”
“Not a bit,” responded Madeline, “only if we’re going to-day we ought to start in a few minutes and have lunch there, because the tide is low about noon, and at low tide the ferry-boat doesn’t run, or if it does it starts from some inconvenient place.”
“Then if Dinard is dressy, I can’t go,” said Betty sadly. “Every one of my thin waists is torn, and it takes ages to mend them nicely.”
“Then why don’t you come over in the afternoon and meet us there?” suggested Madeline. “The pretty French girl who sits opposite us at table d’hôte says that there is a Casino where they have music in the afternoons. People motor in from the châteaux, and it’s great fun sitting on the piazzas and watching the gaiety. I’ll wait and come with you, if you like.”
But Betty insisted that she could go perfectly well alone. “I can say, ‘Ou est le casino?’ beautifully,” she declared, “and if I don’t understand a word of the answer why I can just watch which way they point. The lovely thing about French people is that they always point. I’ll mend all my waists and take the ferry about four, or whenever the tide is right, and meet you at the Casino.”
And so at half-past three,—because, to tell the truth, it was easier to be a little early than to ask the hotel clerk about the tide,—Betty, dressed in her prettiest white suit and her hat with the pink roses, came out of the hotel and started down the road to the ferry landing. It was a hot day and the road was dusty, and she hurried as fast as possible to get into the shelter of the little park just back of the landing. But before she reached it she heard a shout from the bottom of the landing-steps, and the next minute she realized that somebody was calling her,—a stout gentleman, who, having detached himself from the little crowd that had gathered there, was laboriously climbing the steps to meet her, still calling and beckoning frantically as he came. But instead of using her name he was shouting, “Miss B. A.! Miss B. A.!” And this, before he was near enough to be recognized, gave Betty the clue to his identity. It was Jasper J. Morton, of course.
His coat was off, he carried his hat in his hand, and his face was red with heat and indignation.
“Do you speak English?” he demanded, when he was near enough to be heard. “I mean do you speak French? I’ve been tearing around asking people if they speak English until I’m hoarse.”