The madame leaned back, laughing in keenest enjoyment.
"I had forgotten how delightful it is that children may be in a state of nature," she said. "Ah, Robare, how can we go back to those doll-childs at the hotel, with their so fine costumes, and so of-this-world-weary airs, now? You have no doll-houses, my infants, no fine toys that move by the machine-work within, no bicycles, no anything for play; what, then, does amuse you all the day's length in this most sleepy town?"
The children stared at her with round, puzzled eyes.
What did they find to amuse them? With the cliffs, and the sand, and sea, and the nice little lobster and clam basins they knew about; and the countless shells for dishes, and fish-scales for jewellery, and kelp for carpets, and dulse and feathery sea-fern for decorations.
"Dear me!" cried Molly, "there's things enough; all we want is time. Here I've wasted a whole morning darning stockings and talking to you!"
The outburst that followed this naive confession brought uneasy Sara to her sister's side; and with a hand on one of those restless, twitching little shoulders, she managed to keep her respectably quiet through the rest of the call.
As the guests went down the village street it was funny to hear their comments.
"It ees a most fine collection, all varieties and classified most orderly," observed the professor, intent on the minerals.
"Such specimens! And impossible to keep in order!" broke out the young man, meaning something entirely different. "But the oldest is a rare one, and"—
"Ze oldest? Yes, but there be some vich are mos' rare of dose later ones, too. But"—