This ought to have been sufficient to please even the critical Martine, and had Mr. Knight not used the word "boy" she might have been quite content. As it was, this word happened to irritate her, and she responded in a tone that disturbed Amy:
"Oh, did you say that Mr. Airton is younger than you? Isn't he considerably taller?"
If Mr. Knight's face had been red before, it now became almost a deep, deep crimson. Amy, rejoicing that her mother's seat was so far from Martine's that she had not heard this remark, resolved at the earliest opportunity to have a word alone with Martine.
The opportunity, however, did not come for some time, and meanwhile Mr. Knight talked enthusiastically of the apple crops of Cornwallis, and of the fortune that any man might gather who would deal intelligently with the Gravenstein.
"The Cornwallis Valley," he said, "is one of the finest farming regions in the world. You will see what I mean when you go to the Look-off, as you will while you are here. But now—"
"Oh, is this an old French church?" asked Martine, excitedly, as they approached an ancient wooden structure half hidden by Lombardy poplars.
If Mr. Knight heard her, he did not reply, but he jumped to the ground, even before the driver had fairly pulled up his horses, and then, when the carriage came to a full stop, offered to assist Mrs. Redmond to the ground.
"This," he began, "is sometimes incorrectly called an Acadian church."
"Does he mean to snub me?" whispered Martine to Priscilla.
"Yet it is merely an old Scotch church," continued Mr. Knight, "built about a hundred years ago. A service is held here two or three times a year, but the building receives no great care, and, as you can see, even some of its windows have been broken by mischievous boys."