On the way Rhoda Polly ran hither and thither gathering flowers. With us at Aramon the spring is well under way before the autumn flowers are tired of blooming. She gathered purple colt's-foot and orchis, yellow iris and goats' honeysuckle. Troops of butterflies attended us, especially the Red Admiral and the swift poising Humming Bird Moth, some of them so large as to look like the bird itself. Even Bates on his beloved Amazon was deceived by it, as I took care to tell Rhoda Polly.
We arrived at the edge of the crossing, and from the bank I shouted for Jeanne to take us over. She came down tall and nonchalant, an oar over her shoulder, unlocked the padlock and rowed unconcernedly across. She stood to help Rhoda Polly in, and then handed me the bow oar as was our habit like one long accustomed to such visits. I delayed introductions till we had reached the farther side. Rhoda Polly gave Jeanne her hand with the swift grip of liking. But I saw a glow in Jeanne's eyes as she took the oar away from me and marched with them both over her shoulder to the house.
"Mademoiselle Deventer, mother," she cried, "come to visit us. Monsieur has brought her—so kind of Monsieur!"
And Jeanne vanished round the corner with a kind of swirl of her pretty figure, the oar-blades swooping perilously after her.
"I say," whispered Rhoda Polly, "that girl has never worn stays. Did you see her waist and hips when she turned—a full half circle? None of us, pinched-up wretches that we are, could do that! It was beautiful, the poetry of motion."
I did not say so aloud, but I knew that it was something quite different on Jeanne's part—in fact, a little fling of temper. And with the thought of opening out the matter of Alida on the way home, I began to wish that Rhoda Polly and I had taken another road than that which led to the riverside hostelry of the Sambre-et-Meuse.
Mère Félix was clamorous with welcomes, smiling heartsomely upon the daughter of the powerful manager of her husband's works, and quite willing to accept me as an elderly relative placed in charge of the outing. In which she made mistake, for nothing is more certain that all such expeditions were conducted according to the sole will of Rhoda Polly.
We arranged for lunch to be served under the tonnelle overlooking the river, and I stayed in the kitchen along with Mère Félix and the moon-faced maid-of-all-work. It was in my mind that perhaps Rhoda Polly might strike up one of her friendships with Jeanne, or at least do something to explain away the rather strained situation. Nor did I seem to be altogether wrong, for presently I saw the two girls amicably putting a boat to rights after a night's fishing in the flooded river. They were too distant for me to gather anything from their behaviour to one another. But presently it was evident that Rhoda Polly was talking in her wild harum-scarum fashion, for Jeanne threw back her head suddenly with a tinkle of laughter and a flash of brown throat showing pleasantly under a scarlet kerchief. I said in my heart—so vain and foolish was I—that the battle was to the cunning, and I thought no small potatoes of myself at that moment.
I soon found, however, that Jeanne, though she might laugh at Rhoda Polly's freely expressed yarns, had no intention of forgiving me. If Rhoda Polly was heart-free, that was certainly not my fault.
So when they came back to the house I tried in vain to inveigle Jeanne behind the barns where the fish-ponds lay safe and solitary, so that I might explain at my leisure. But it was "Monsieur is too good, but a poor girl has her work to do. She has no time to go off sightseeing of a forenoon even with so charming a cicerone as Monsieur!"