“Forgive me, Ma'amselle,” he said, “my speech was foolish as my heart. They are both sobered.”
“Then,” said the girl, drawing aside the folds of her dress, “you may sit beside me.”
With a sudden diffidence he sank upon the stone, this handsome boy whose tongue was ever ready and whose heart of a light o' love had taken toll from every maid in the settlement, and for the first time in his life he had no sprightly word, no quip for his careless tongue.
They sat in silence, and presently he saw that her eyes were again half-closed and the dreaming look had settled back in them. She had forgotten his presence.
Never before in his experience had a woman sat thus unmoved beside him when he longed to make her speak, and it stilled him with silent wonder.
He thought of the words of Pierre Garcon that day on the river bank when this maid was new to the post, “if there is, I would not be the one to waken it and not be found its master,” and they sent a thrill to his inmost being.
Who would awaken her; he wondered, as he watched the cheek beside him from the tail of his eye, a round womanly cheek, sweet and full and rich as a damask rose with the thick lashes above shining like jet.
Obedient to her silence, he sat still while she dreamed her dream out to its conclusion, and presently she straightened with a little breath like a sigh, unclasped her hands from her knees and turned her glance upon him as if she saw him for the first time.
His head whirled suddenly and he sought for some common word to cover his rare confusion.
“See, Ma'amselle,” he said, pointing, “the well-lashed packs of the fat winter beaver. Truly they come well laden, these Assiniboines, and we may well thank le bon Dieu for the wealth of skins. Is it not a heartening sight?”