CHAPTER XIII.
[ON ACCOUNT OF STRAWBERRIES].
The tea-table was set on the lawn where the lengthening shadows inscribed themselves map-wise in islands and peninsulas of coolness; and within the opened windows on the verandah were other refreshments, whither the gentlemen were invited to bend their steps, while the ladies with their ices remained out of doors. Muriel looking up, saw Pierre disappearing among the bushes along the approach.
"Auntie," she whispered to Matilda, "give me a big heaped-up plate of strawberries and ice-cream for poor Pierre. See, there he goes away home, all by himself. How lonely he must feel! and hot, and thirsty, to see us all sitting out here eating nice things. Quick! Tilly, dear, or he will be through the gate, and at his own door before I can catch him; and then I may meet Annette, who is never nice to me. I don't like Annette."
The plate was speedily filled and heaped up, and away she ran.
To Pierre, trudging along the gravel in his heavy boots, the light footsteps in pursuit were inaudible; and it was not till passing the gate, he stopped to close it behind him, that he heard his name called, and looking up, saw Muriel running towards him. Of course he stopped, and of course, too, being French, and a civil lad, he pulled off his cap and waited. An English lad would probably have turned back to meet the young mistress; but Pierre was apt to grow confused when Muriel appeared suddenly, she was so airy and different from his own heavy lumbering self. So there he stood, stock still like Jack stepping off his bean-stalk, when the fairy tripping down the meadow from the giant's castle, accosted him.
"Here, Pierre, I have brought you these. I wish I had seen you to give them sooner. You could have eaten them in the garden then, which would have been nicer."
"Oh! mademoiselle ees too kind," mumbled Pierre, reddening to the roots of his hair and looking sheepishly grateful. "Too moosh of trouble to give mademoiselle," and the burning black eyes looked out from under their lashes as if they would have spoken things forbidden to the stammering tongue. But there came a shrill call up the road just then, "Pier-r-re!" which quenched their lustre in a moment, and brought a faint frown of impatience even to Muriel's sunny brow.
"Your mother is calling you, Pierre. Good night. Bon appétit.
"Ah! coquin! What is it thou dost there?" was the greeting which met him as he drew near, from his mother standing in the road before the door. "Cochon! Bête! And thou lingerest at the gate with the donzelle, forsooth. Thou!--Deny it not! Undutiful! And I have beaten thee for it when thou wert small, till my poor heart ached more than the bruises on thy little skin. And still thou wilt persist. I pray the heavenly queen upon my knees, and all the saints, to let thee die sooner than come to love her. 'Twere mortal sin."