"Oh, goody, goody!" shouted little Patsy, his pale, beautiful face aglow with delight.
"Poor little manny!" groaned Carroll to his wife, looking after the pair as they rode off up the trail. "It's not many ye'll be after lickin', except with yer tongue."
"But, begorra," said his wife, "that's the lickin' that hurts, afther all. An' it's harrd tellin' what'll be comin' till the lad."
Her husband turned without more words and went into the house. Meantime Marion and Patsy were enjoying their canter.
"Take me up to the Jumping Rock," said the boy, and they took the trail that wound up the west side of the lake.
"There now, Patsy," said Marion, when they had arrived at a smooth shelf of rock that rose sheer out of the blue water of the lake, "I'll put you by the big spruce there, and you can see all over the lake and everywhere."
She slipped off the pony, carefully lifted the boy down and set him leaning against a big spruce pine that grew seemingly up out of the bare rock and leaned far out over the water. This was the swimming place for the boys and men of the village; and an ideal place it was, for off the rock or out of the overhanging limbs the swimmers could dive without fear into the clear, deep water below.
"There now, Patsy," said the girl after she had picketed her pony, "shall I tell you a story?"
"No. Sing, Mayan, I like you to sing."
But just as the girl was about to begin he cried, "Who's that comin', Mayan?" pointing down the trail.