"Almost well. They often bring him in when you are asleep. I daresay it would amuse you to have him sit on your bed for awhile."
Vesper was silent, and, after a time, his mother ran on: "This French district is delightfully unique. I never was in such an out-of-the-world place except in Europe. I feel as if I had been moved back into a former century, when I see those women going about in their black handkerchiefs. I sit at the window and watch them going by,—I should never weary of them."
Vesper said nothing, but he reflected affectionately and acutely that in a fortnight his appreciative but fickle mother would be longing for the rustle of silks, the flutter of laces, and the hum of fashionable conversation on a veranda, which was her idea of an enjoyable summer existence.
[CHAPTER IX.]
A TALK ON THE WHARF.
"Long have I lingered where the marshlands are,
Oft hearing in the murmur of the tide
The past, alive again and at my side,
With unrelenting power and hateful war."
J. F. H.
"There goes the priest of the parish in his buggy," said Mrs. Nimmo. "He must have a sick call."
She sat on a garden chair, crocheting a white shawl and watching the passers-by on the road.