TWO MISHAPS
Fortunately the tide was out; so the water was not very deep, and while
Desiré stood on the bridge and watched helplessly, and Jack was looking
for a place where he could go to her assistance, Priscilla managed to get
out of the water.
“Don’t come down,” she called, “you’ll fall too. I’ll be up soon.”
But the mud was very slippery; and again and again she slid back, while
René shouted with laughter, and clapped his hands. Even Desiré had to
smile; for Priscilla did look funny, plastered with red mud, and dripping
with water. Jack again started toward her, but Desiré held him back.
“There is no use in two of you getting in that state. She’s in no danger,
and since she is lighter in weight than you, she stands a much better
chance of climbing up that bank. Prissy,” she called, “crawl on your
hands and knees.”
The little girl obeyed, and finally reached the top, where Jack stretched
out a strong hand to pull her over the edge.
“What shall I do?” she wailed, holding her sticky arms out straight from
her body, and half blinded by the wet, muddy hair hanging over her face.
“I wish I knew,” said Desiré. “Can you walk home, do you think?”
“I guess so. I’ll try; but—but—I lost all my berries!”
“You look like a big berry yourself, you’re so red,” gurgled René.
At least one of the party was enjoying the incident to the utmost.
It took a long time to scrape and wash the mud off poor Priscilla, and
when the task was accomplished they were exhausted.
While the others were occupied, René had been playing about by himself.
Just as Priscilla looked once more like herself, the little boy ran
toward the group crying at the top of his voice.
“What’s happened?” demanded Jack, advancing to meet the child and picking
him up.
“Bite!” he wailed, holding out his finger.
“What bit you?”
“Long, wiggly thing,” sobbed the little fellow. “Ran away so fast.”
“Snake!” said Desiré. “Oh, Jack! What shall we do?”
“Don’t be frightened,” said the boy, calmly sitting down with the little
fellow on his lap, and examining the finger carefully. He found the bite,
and putting it to his lips, began to suck the blood from it while Desiré
helped hold René still.
“Jack, do be careful,” she begged anxiously; “be sure not to swallow any
of it,” as he paused to dispose of what he had drawn from the wound. “Be
quiet, Renny; brother is trying to make you well; so you mustn’t mind if
he hurts you a little.”
Priscilla, with terrified eyes, stood looking on helplessly until Desiré
sent her for a box of emergency supplies which she had prepared before
leaving Sissiboo.
“I hardly think it was a poisonous snake,” said Jack, when he had done
all he could; “but I suppose it is best to be on the safe side. I had
better take him in to Kentville to a doctor.”
“Oh, yes,” breathed Desiré, in great relief; “and let him see if you’re
all right too.”
They hitched up the horses and drove into the town, and while Jack and
Desiré took René to the physician’s office, Priscilla took the berries
they had gathered that day to her first customer, Mrs. Auberge. They had
become good friends, and the little girl naturally told her of the recent
accidents.
“There are no dangerous snakes right around here,” she said soothingly;
“but it does no harm to have a doctor look the boy over. So you’re going
on tomorrow? I’ll miss you. How would you like to stay with me for the
rest of the summer and help me with the tourists? I’ll pay you.”
“I’d have to ask Jack,” replied the child slowly, after a minute’s
thought. “I’ll come back and let you know.”
She met the others just coming out of the doctor’s house.
“Renny and Jack are both all right,” Desiré cried joyfully to her little
sister. “Where have you been?”
“I sold the berries to Mrs. Auberge; and—and—Jack—”
“Yes?”
“She wants me to stay here and help her for the rest of the summer, and
she’ll pay me.”
Desiré glanced quickly at Jack, who stood regarding Priscilla very
gravely.
“Do you want to stay?” he inquired, finally.
“It would bring in some money—I’d be glad—that is—”
“That isn’t what I asked you, Prissy. I said do you _want_ to stay.”
“Answer Jack, dear,” urged Desiré, as the child stood silent, hanging her
head. “Don’t be afraid to say just what you feel.”
“She isn’t afraid,” said Jack gently. “Do you want to stay with Mrs.
Auberge, dear?”
Priscilla shook her head.
“All right,” replied her brother; “that settles it.”
“I told her I’d let her know—” began the little girl.
“Very well. Run back and thank her nicely for her offer, but say that
this summer we are all going to stay together. We’ll walk on slowly, and
you can catch up with us.”
Before they had gone far, they heard running steps behind them; and
Priscilla came abreast, catching Jack by the hand.
“See what she gave me,” holding up a box as she spoke; “a game we can all
play; and any time I want to, I can stay and help her.”
“That’s very nice of her,” said Desiré. “How wonderful people are to us
everywhere.”
“It’s a good thing,” remarked Jack that night, “that tomorrow we shall
return to our regular occupation and way of living. I feel as if I had
had enough excitement today to last for the rest of the summer.”
“Oh, of that kind, perhaps,” agreed Desiré; “but there are other kinds;
and those I hope we’ll meet. Did the doctor charge much?”
“About half what we made on the berries,” smiled Jack.
“But we’re still a little better off than when we came.”
“Yes, some; but not much.”
“Well, never mind; huckleberries are coming, and we’ll make it up on
them,” decided Desiré hopefully. “Wasn’t it dear of Prissy to be willing
to go to work?”
“Yes, she spoke of it again when I bade her goodnight; but I said we
could support her until she is older. While it can be managed otherwise,
I hate to have her cooped up in a strange house doing all kinds of odd
jobs.”
“We haven’t done so badly thus far, have we?”
“No; but we haven’t made anywhere near enough to settle down somewhere
and go to school.”
“But the summer isn’t over yet; and who knows what will happen before
winter comes?”
“You’re a hopeful little pal, Dissy,” he said, kissing her fondly.
“Now we must begin to look for the Godet house,” said Desiré, pulling out
her little blue history the next morning, when they were on the way to
Wolfville.
“I was sorry we could get no information, when we passed through Wilmot,
about the first Wistmore house in this country,” said Jack.
“They lived on a sheep farm when they came here from the States, and
probably the place looks like all others of its kind,” replied Desiré,
poring over the book.
“I think the Godet house must be the other side of Grand Pré,” observed
Jack, looking over her shoulder. “We’ll go there first.”
So they turned off the main road and drove down the hill, through the
straggling village, its long street bordered by spreading trees and
scattered white houses far back from the road. The great marsh meadow,
which was the Grand Pré of Longfellow’s poem _Evangeline_, has been set
apart as a park, and is surrounded by a fence. By going through a
gate-house, one enters the enclosure known as Acadian National Park.
As the Wistmores descended the low broad step on the park side of the
gate-house, René, his eyes on the distant well of which he had heard his
sisters talking, put one foot right into a very small flower-bordered
pool at the left of the step. Everyone turned at the sound of the splash.
“Renny!” exclaimed Priscilla severely, “I never saw such a child for
water.”
“You rolled right into the river,” retorted the little boy, “and got all
red mud too!”
Jack and Desiré exchanged smiles.
For an hour the children wandered over the interesting and beautiful
meadowland, dotted with large beds of gorgeous flowers.
“What a sense of spaciousness, and of peace, the place gives one,”
observed Desiré, as they stood before the little chapel, gazing about
them. “Look, René, at the swallows’ nests.”
On the walls, close to the buttress which supports the sharply slanting
roof, several nests were plastered.
“And is this the very same church mentioned in _Evangeline_?” inquired
Priscilla, nearly breaking her neck to look up at the belfry, surmounted
by a tall four-sided spire.
“No; but it is built on the site of that one, and the row of willows you
see down there to the right grew on the main street of Grand Pré. The
first settlers brought the shoots from Normandy. The well we passed on
our way up is the same one from which the inhabitants of the olden
village obtained their water supply. Just north of here is the Basin of
Minas, where the people embarked on the ship which carried them away at
the time of the Expulsion. This meadowland all around us was protected
from the high tides by dykes like you saw a few weeks ago in Bear River.
At one side of the Basin lies Cape Blomidon, where the amethysts are
found; and—”
“Where Glooscap lived,” interrupted René, always glad to contribute to
the narratives.
“Yes,” assented Jack, “where Glooscap lived. After the hay was cut from
the meadows,” he continued, “cattle were turned in to graze until winter
came.”
“How queer it makes one feel to be here,” observed Desiré dreamily.
They missed Priscilla at that moment, and looking around, saw her
standing in front of the large bronze statue of Evangeline, which is in
the centre of the park.
“She doesn’t look at all like I thought she would,” commented the little
girl in disappointed tones, as the others joined her. They all gazed in
silence for a moment at the sorrowful figure, looking backward at the
land she was so reluctant to leave.
“You probably like to think of her, as I do, in a happier mood,” said
Desiré; “but she must have been pretty sad when she went away.”
“We had better go on now,” decided Jack. So they followed the little
stream which twists its way across the meadow; a mere thread in some
places, in others wide enough to be bridged with single planks. Once it
spread out into a fair-sized pond, covered with water lilies and guarded
by a family of ducks who regarded the visitors scornfully.
“Now for _our_ house,” cried Desiré as they drove onto the main road
again. “Please go very slowly, Jack, so that we won’t miss it.”
They all peered eagerly out of the wagon; and when they saw, up a little
lane, a dilapidated-looking building, they all exclaimed together—“_That_
must be it!”
Jack drove as close as the underbrush would allow, and they proceeded on
foot until they were standing before a small log cabin, windowless,
doorless, a huge flat stone for a doorstep, and a chimney built of
irregular stones.