CHAPTER IV.THE SLEEPING WATER INN.

THE SLEEPING WATER INN.

"Montrez-moi votre menu et je vous montrerai mon cœur."

A few minutes later, the train had again entered the forest, and Vesper, who had a passion for trees and ranked them with human beings in his affections, allowed the mystery and charm of these foreigners to steal over him. In dignified silence and reserve the tall pines seemed to draw back from the rude contact of the passing train. The more assertive firs and spruces stood still, while the slender hackmatacks, most beautiful of all the trees of the wood, writhed and shook with fright, nervously tossing their tremulous arms and tasselled heads, and breathing long odoriferous sighs that floated after, but did not at all touch the sympathies of the roaring monster from the outer world who so often desecrated their solitude.

Vesper's delicate nostrils dilated as the spicy odors saluted them, and he thought, with tenderness, of the home trees that he loved, the elms of the Common and those of the square where he had been[Pg 48] born. How many times he had encircled them with admiring footsteps, noting the individual characteristics of each tree, and giving to each one a separate place in his heart. Just for an instant he regretted that for to-night he could not lie down in their shadow. Then he turned irritably to the salesman, who was stretching and shaking out his legs, and performing other calisthenic exploits as accompaniments of waking.

[Pg 48]

"Haven't we come to Great Scott yet?" he asked, getting up, and sauntering to Vesper's window.

Vesper consulted his folder. Among the French names he could discover nothing like this, unless it was Grosses Coques, so called, his guide-book told him, because the Acadiens had discovered enormous clams there.

The salesman settled the question by dabbing at the name with his fat forefinger. "Confound these French names, and thank the Lord they're beginning to give them up. This Sleeping Water we're coming to used to be L'Eau Dormante. If I had my way, I'd string up on these pines every fellow that spoke a word of this gibberish. That would cure 'em. Why can't they have one language, as we do?"

"How would you like to talk French?" asked Vesper, quietly.

The little man laughed shrewdly, and not unkindly.[Pg 49] "Every man to 

 Prev. P 28/309 next