“Regard the mountains, my child!” said Madame. “They also are dressed to welcome us, is it not so?”
Honor looked up, and the mountains took possession of her again. One could hardly look at the white giants themselves, they were too dazzling, midway between the vivid blues of sky and lake, the blinding sunlight beating on them. Instinctively one’s eyes blinked, fell, rested on the lovely green of the lower forest-clad heights; lower still, on the mellow brown huddle at their feet, on the very edge of the water, the Rocks of Meillerie.
“Behold!” said Madame. “The good rocks which await us!”
The good rocks, basking in sunshine as soft as it was warm, neither dazzled nor blinded; they welcomed. They were actually warm under the feet, as, released from the steamer, the happy girls clambered over them, laden with baskets, shawls, campstools.
“This way!” the brown rocks invited: “to the left here, my children, under our shadow, for the sun is hot! here rather to the right, since the footing is better. Yonder is a place of treachery; avoid always that emerald patch! Unknown depths lurk beneath.”
And so on, and so on! Did the rocks actually speak, or was it Soeur Séraphine panting in the rear, cautioning, adjuring? Never mind! Here they were at last in the picnic place, their own place, discovered by the two good sisters, Madame Madeleine and Soeur Séraphine, hundreds of years ago, when they were girls themselves. No one else knew of it, they were sure; except, of course, Atli and Gretli, and they were safe. It was a family affair, the rock parlor, with its brown walls and its carpet of softest moss. No treachery here! The moss was as dry as it was soft; a wonderful moss, like tiny velvet ferns; Honor and Stephanie agreed it could grow nowhere else in the world. Here and there baby rocks jutted through the green, making perfect stools; there was even an armchair for Madame; it was arranged, Soeur Séraphine assured them gaily. Nature, the good Mother Superior of the White Sisters yonder—she indicated the towering giants above them—had designed this place for them.
“Sit down, my children! My sister, this cushion for thy back, is it not so? Voilà!”
The snowy cloth was laid on the moss before Madame’s rock armchair; the baskets were unpacked, amid squeaks of rapture. Oh! the great pie! ah! the brioches, the galette, the Lyons sausage, all the good, good Swiss dainties! how wonderful they were, eaten here in the rock parlor, at the very foot of the mountains! And when the girls were thirsty—Ah! at the good hour! Here were Atli and Gretli.
Down through the brown rocks, stepping as sturdily and easily as if on level ground, came the gigantic twins, Margoton’s brother and sister; he bearing a shining milkcan, she a comb of golden honey in a blue bowl. This also was a part of the regular programme. Never were twins more alike. Clip Gretli’s flaxen hair and put her into Atli’s white shirt, broad green breeches and worsted stockings; furnish Atli with two heavy braids hanging to his waist, and dress him in bodice and petticoat—Madame asked you—was there a difference? They were superb, even Patricia allowed that. Their massive, regular features, their blue eyes, the flash of their white teeth, the ruddy brown of cheek and chin, contrasting with the milk-white strip of forehead when the shady hat came off—all this with the figure of a Norse viking and—“Is there such a word as ‘vi-queen’?” asked Patricia. Soeur Séraphine thought not: the idea, however, was admirable. That was certainly what our good Atli and Gretli resembled. Vee-king! vee-quin—: ki—veen! my faith! That was difficult, if you would! a majestic language, but of a complexity!
Honor thought silently that they were more like the Norse Gods: Baldur the Beautiful, Nanna the Fair: there was a story about them in a little brown book—