"Good-day, little one," he called; "where are you going?"
"To the hotel, Uncle Placide."
"How happens it?"
"These American ladies have asked me. I am to have tea."
"Ah, well, she is a dear little one, and you are good to her."
The whole party had now halted in front of the gate, and these words seemed to be particularly addressed to Amy; for, standing directly in front of her, Placide lifted his hat. "Won't you enter?" he asked pleasantly.
"But, uncle," remonstrated Yvonne, "we have no time; we go to the hotel."
"Oh, but there is much time; I have been in the States, and I like to talk to the strangers, so enter my garden at least, ladies, to taste of my cherries."
There was nothing to do but enter the garden. At the mention of cherries Yvonne indeed had seemed more willing to halt on her way to the hotel, and the others, as Placide thrust upon them liberal handfuls of his great crimson cherries, did not regret the delay.
"You are from Boston," he said, after Amy had mentioned her home. "Ah, I worked in Boston, that is, in Lowell, which was the same, and then I came home when I had saved enough to buy a house. It is not so gay here as in Lowell, but it is happier, and I can make a pleasanter living. I never did like the mill, but the pay was good."