“Why I believe I can.” For what were points for hiking to Hilary when an invitation from Campbell was in question?
Patty was not there, but Hilary asked the camp mother if Mr. Stuart might paddle her home, and permission was granted. Smiling, Hilary ran back to Campbell, stopping a moment to tell Frances of her change of plan. “She asked me if you would upset the canoe,” Hilary reported to Campbell, as they started off briskly, “and I told her that you could do anything!”
“That was rather a doubtful reply,” remarked Campbell.
“She understood all right, but looked at me so soberly, just as if she were going to refuse, asked me if you were Cathalina’s cousin and all sorts of things that she knew perfectly well, just to make me think that perhaps I could not go, but I knew that she was doing it for fun.”
“Did the girls mind your going?”
“No. Frances was lovely, and said that she would tell Marion.”
Hatless and brown from the sun, a typical summer girl and boy, Hilary and Campbell swung along the way to the shore where the canoe waited. It was pleasant to be taken care of, Hilary thought, as Campbell did the launching and most of the paddling, and told Hilary to “fold her hands and look pretty”.
“How could I!” she exclaimed with a laugh.
“You don’t have to try,” returned Campbell with an approving glance. But this was the nearest approach to sentiment that he made that summer. “Where shall we go? Into the bay and up the Androscoggin a little way?”
“That will be fine,” Hilary assented. “We still have an hour or so, haven’t we? We were only there about half an hour, I think. I didn’t wear my watch, though.”