“Why did you wish to miss the Gypsy song and dance?” demanded Mollie. “It was charming.”
“Pardon, Mademoiselle,” he replied, stiffly, “but I do not care to hear the songs of my country, or to see its dances in a foreign land.”
Mollie was a little piqued by José’s short answer, but she forgave him when he said sadly:
“Did you ever know, Madamoiselle, what it is to be homesick?”
“But I thought you said you liked America?” she persisted.
“So I do,” he replied; “nevertheless, there are times when I feel very lonely. You will forgive me, will you not. Was I rude?”
In the meantime Stephen said to Barbara:
“Bab, are you a good walker? How would you like to take a short cut through the woods to-morrow morning, and visit the hermit who lives on the other side? We can’t ride or drive very well, because it is too far by the road, but it is only about five miles when we walk. I haven’t been there for several years, but I know the way well. I suppose the hermit is still alive. At least, he was all right last summer, so John the butler told me. Anybody else who wishes may go along, but nobody shall come who will lag behind and complain of the distance.”
“I am good for a ten mile walk,” replied Barbara. “I have done it many a time at home.”
“The woods grow more and more interesting the deeper you go into them,” continued Stephen. “There are places where the sun never comes through, and the whole way is cool and shaded. It is full of people, too. You would be surprised to find how many people make a living in a forest. They are perfectly harmless, of course, or else I wouldn’t be taking you among them. Besides the Gypsies, there are woodcutters, old men and women who gather herbs, and a few lonely people who live in cabins on the edge of the forest and have little gardens. Uncle has always helped them, in the winter, without asking who they were or why they were there. Then there’s the hermit. He is the most interesting of the lot. He is as old as the hills and he has a secret that he would never tell, the secret of who he is and why he has lived alone for some forty years.”