I had flung off my cap with the exaggerated manner I sometimes used with her; and she dropped me a courtesy with the prettiest grace in the world.
"I shall be with you in a moment, my lord!"
She reappeared quickly and remarked, as I took her wraps, that Helen was very sorry not to come.
The gardener was on duty, and I called Ijima to help with the launch. Brightly decorated boats were already visible in the direction of Port Annandale; even the tireless lake "tramps" whistled with a special flourish and were radiant in vari-colored lanterns.
"This is an ampler Venice, but there should be music to make it complete," observed Miss Pat, as we stole in and out among the gathering fleet. And then, as though in answer, a launch passed near, leaving a trail of murmurous chords behind—the mournful throb of the guitar, the resonant beat of banjo strings. Nothing can be so soothing to the troubled spirit as music over water, and I watched with delight Miss Pat's deep absorption in all the sights and sounds of the lake. We drifted past a sail-boat idling with windless sails, its mast trimmed with lanterns, and every light multiplying itself in the quiet water. Many and strange craft appeared—farm folk and fishermen in clumsy rowboats and summer colonists in launches, skiffs and canoes, appeared from all directions to watch the parade.
The assembling canoes flashed out of the dark like fireflies. Not even the spirits that tread the air come and go more magically than the canoe that is wielded by a trained hand. The touch of the skilled paddler becomes but a caress of the water. To have stolen across Saranac by moonlight; to have paddled the devious course of the York or Kennebunk when the sea steals inland for rest, or to dip up stars in lovely Annandale—of such experiences is knowledge born!
I took care that we kept well to ourselves, for Miss Pat turned nervously whenever a boat crept too near. Ijima, understanding without being told, held the power well in hand. I had scanned the lake at sundown for signs of the Stiletto, but it had not ventured from the lower lake all day, and there was scarce enough air stirring to ruffle the water.
"We can award the prize for ourselves here at the turn of the loop," I remarked, as we swung into place and paused at a point about a mile off Glenarm. "Here comes the flotilla!"
"The music is almost an impertinence, lovely as it is. The real song of the canoe is 'dip and glide, dip and glide,'" said Miss Pat.
The loop once made, we now looked upon a double line whose bright confusion added to the picture. The canoe offers, when you think of it, little chance for the decorator, its lines are so trim and so founded upon rigid simplicity; but many zealous hands had labored for the magic of this hour. Slim masts supported lanterns in many and charming combinations, and suddenly, as though the toy lamps had taken wing, rockets flung up their stars and roman candles their golden showers at a dozen points of the line and broadened the scope of the picture. A scow placed midway of the loop now lighted the lake with red and green fire. The bright, graceful argosies slipped by, like beads upon a rosary. When the last canoe had passed, Miss Pat turned to me, sighing softly: