12 Chapeau Dieu

“AND it is all Snowball’s fault!” It is Rene who speaks the words, passionate anger in his voice—the first words that break the long silence. Far off, the batteau is but a white drifting speck, after which they strain their eyes until they are half blind. Johnny’s eyes are dim.

“It is all Snowball’s fault!” passionately repeats Rene. Far away and faint, her sweet singing reaches them, broken now and then, as the fruit she picks finds its way between her rosy lips, instead of into the shining pail. The sound is to his wrath as “vinegar upon niter.”

“It is all her fault. She would come to Chapeau Dieu, she would land here and nowhere else. Johnny, it serves you right! You yield to her in everything. You should not have let her force you to land here.”

Johnny says nothing. “His heart is with his eyes, and that is far away”—far away, to where Boule-de-neige, beautiful, traitorous Boule-de-neige, floats out to the open sea.

“She is a tyrant. Every one spoils her—you all do—papa, Weesy, and you, Johnny, worst of all. You let her have her way in everything, and no good ever can come of it. Now, we are here, and here we may remain. And it is all her doing from first to last.”

“It’s no use talking now,” says Johnny, huskily, “the batteau’s gone—gone!”

“Yes, I see it’s gone,” bitterly, “and I hear her singing over yonder still! You had better go and tell her, and see if she will not change her tune!”

Johnny turns away—not to tell Snowball, however. The boat is quite out of sight now, gone forever it may be, and Johnny feels that his voice is not to be trusted, with this great lump rising and falling in his throat!

There is a pause. Rene stands, a statue of angry grief and despair, and still strains his eyes over the blue shining sea. No boats are to be seen; far off on the horizon there are sails, but none of these sails will ever come near. All craft steer wide of fatal Chapeau Dieu.

“What are we to do?” he bursts out at length; “look here, Johnny, it’s no time to sit down and cry.”

“I’m not crying!” retorts Johnny, angrily, looking up, but his eyes look red as he says it, and his voice breaks short.

“The batteau’s gone,” pursues the relentless Rene, “and we are here. Now how are we to get off?”

“Wait until something comes along and takes us off, I suppose.”

“And how long may that be? Nothing ever comes this way—no one in their senses ever lands at Needle’s Point. You know that. Unless a storm drives a fishing boat or a coaster out of their course, nothing will ever come within miles of us. Then what are we to do?”

“They will miss us, and search for us,” says Johnny, waking up somewhat to a sense of personal danger.

“Will they? No one knows where we are. More of Snowball’s doing—she wouldn’t let you tell Ma’am Weesy. Weesy will not miss us until bedtime—then who is to search? She and old Tim are alone on the island, and he can’t leave the Light. If he feels in the humor, he may perhaps go to St. Gildas to-morrow, and give the alarm. Then, by noon, some one may be ready to start in the search, but where are they to look? You and Snowball go everywhere, up and down the coast for twenty miles—a wide circuit to search over—and no one will think of Chapeau Dieu until every other place has been given up. That may not be for days, and in three days papa will be back home. How do you suppose he will feel?”

“By George!” says Johnny, blankly.

“I suppose we will not starve,” goes on Rene, still bitterly; “there are the berries we came for, and here is a spring. And it won’t hurt us to sleep on the ground. We can rough it. But our father—it will about kill him.”

“And Snowball,” says Johnny, pitifully, “poor little Snowball. She can’t rough it. What will become of Snowball?”

“Nothing she does not richly deserve. Let us hope it will be a lesson to her—if she—we—any of us leave this mountain alive. It is her doing from first to last. Let her take the consequences! I, for one, don’t pity her.”

“Poor little Snowball,” repeats Johnny, softly. He never argues, but he is not easily convinced. Even the loss of Boule-de-neige is forgotten, in this new state of things. “I’m awfully sorry for Snowball.”

“You are an idiot, Johnny!” savagely; “think of yourself.”

“Well—I do. I can’t help thinking of her, though, too. Poor little thing, how is she to sleep on the turf? And she is not strong. And she never meant any harm. Don’t be so hard, old fellow.”

The gentle sea-gray eyes look wistfully up—the brown, bright, angry eyes look down. “Have a little pity,” the gray eyes say. And “You’re a good fellow, Johnny,” the brown eyes answer. They soften as they turn away. “It’s an awful fix, though!” he mutters, and looks seaward again, and begins to whistle.

There is a stifled sob behind, but neither hear it. Then, like a guilty thing, Snowball creeps away. It is not her wont to advance unheard—she can make noise enough at any time for a dozen—but the turf has muffled her steps, and raspberries have stopped her mouth. And she has come upon them, unfelt, unseen, and overheard all. All! Rene’s scathing words, Johnny’s regretful pleading. An awful panic of remorse falls upon her. The whole situation as exposed by Rene opens before her, and it is all her doing—hers-her willfulness, obstinacy, selfishness, from first to last! They may perish here. And Dr. Macdonald will break his heart. And she is the cause of it all! She would come, she would land at Needle’s Point, where no boat could be safely moored; she would call to Johnny to hurry! Rene is right—it is all her fault, from beginning to end.

She flings herself on the ground, and buries her wicked face in the grass. All the misdeeds of her life neither few nor far between—rise up before her in remorseful array, but pale into insignificance before this crowning crime. She lies prone, bedewing the dry ferns with her despairing tears, and so, half an hour after, when he quits his brother, Johnny finds her. He looks at her ruefully and uncomfortably—even at fourteen he has a genuine masculine horror of crying—and touches her up gently with the toe of his shoe.

“I say,” he says, with an attempt at gruffness, “stop that, will you!”

Two lovely, blue, shining eyes look up at him, pathetic with heart-broken despair.

“Oh, Johnny!” she cries out in anguished tones.

Johnny has nothing to say to this; indeed, the situation quite goes without saying. He stands gnawing a raspberry branch, and looking still more uncomfortable. But Snowball must talk—if death were the penalty Snowball would talk; talking is her forte, and she has been silent now for over an hour. So she sits up, wipes her eyes, sobs a last sob, and looks at him solemnly.

“Johnny!”

“Yes.”

” This is awful, isn’t it?”

“Pretty awful,” dismally; “the batteau’s gone.”

“Never mind; she won’t go far—somebody will pick her up. Every one knows the Boule-de-neige. She’s all right. Johnny!”

“Yes.”

“Rene feels awfully, don’t he?”

“Pretty awfully. So do I.”

“But it isn’t so bad as he makes out. If there is any chance of seeing the blackest side of things “—the innate spirit of contrariety rising at the bare mention of Rene’s name—”he is sure to see it. It isn’t half so bad.”

“I hope not, I’m sure,” still dismally; “it’s bad enough, I reckon. We’ve got to stay here all night. What do you call that?”

“Oh!—one night—that makes nothing!” loftily. “And we will be taken off to-morrow. I am sure of it.”

“I wish I was, by George! I ain’t, though. And papa will be home in a day or two. That is what Rene—both of us-feel bad about.”

“And don’t you think I do?” indignantly—”would, I mean, only I am certain we will be safe home long before he comes. Now look here. Ma’am Weesy will miss us, won’t she, and be so scared she won’t be able to sleep a wink all night!”

“I dare say.”

“Then to-morrow morning, the first thing, she will rout out old Tim, and make him row her over to St. Gildas. Do you know who will be the first person she will go to see there?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You might, then, if you ever thought at all. She will go to Père Louis. She goes to him first in every worry she has. And you know what he is. Old Tim may take it easy, and let the grass grow under his feet, but Père Louis won’t. He’ll never rest until we’re found.”

“By George!” says Johnny, brightening.

“He’ll move heaven and earth to find us,” pursues Snowball, more and more excited, “and there isn’t a man in St. Gildas isn’t ready to fly, if Père Louis but holds up his finger. You know that. And besides——”

” Well?”

“I told Innocente Desereaux only yesterday we were coming to Chapeau Dieu for raspberries this week. I wanted her to come, but she couldn’t, Rene says. It shows all he knows about it!” resentfully. “They’ll never think of Chapeau Dieu! Don’t you suppose lnno will hear of our being missing, and will tell what I said? And then won’t they come straight here and take us off? Rene indeed! he thinks he knows everything! He isn’t so much wiser than other people, after all, in spite of his big books!”

“You had better go and tell him so,” says Johnny, with a grimace of delight. He has quite come over to Snowball’s view of the question, and his spirits rise proportionately.

“I would in a minute,” retorts Snowball, with fine defiance.

She does not, however; she glances over at him, and her courage, like Bob Acres’, oozes out at the palms of her hands. Truth to tell, he does look rather unapproachable, standing slim, and straight, and dark, with folded arms, his back against a rock, his pale, rather stern face set seaward.

“How will you stow yourself for the night?” asks Johnny, after a pause.

“Oh, anywhere—it doesn’t matter. I will lie under those bushes on the moss—it is soft and dry. Besides, I don’t expect to sleep. Johnny, if Rene wasn’t so grumpy, I would enjoy this.”

“Would you, by George?”

“And you,” says Snowball, with some resentment, “if I’ve heard you say once I’ve heard you ten hundred thousand times say you envied Robinson Crusoe—that you would fairly love to be wrecked on a desert island. And now—isn’t this as good as any desert island, only we’ll get taken off sooner, and you don’t look pleased one bit! You look as sulky as sulky.”

“It’s not half as good as Crusoe’s island,” says Johnny; “we have nothing to eat but raspberries, and a fellow gets tired of raspberries as a steady diet. He had goats, and grapes, and Friday——”

“He didn’t eat Friday. I,” smiling radiantly, “will be your Friday, Johnny.”

“And savages—”

“Rene will do for the savages. And talking of eating”—briskly—”we have enough left in the basket for supper. Suppose we have supper, Johnny? It must be six o’clock, and eating will be better than doing nothing.”

“All right,” responds Johnny, who is always open to anything in this line; “fix things, and I’ll go and tell Rene.”

He tells Rene all Snowball has told him, ending with a fraternal invitation as sent by that young person to come to supper.

“Tell her to eat it herself,” says Rene, shortly, “I don’t want any of her supper. And you had better not take much either, Johnny; pick berries if you are hungry. Snowball may be glad of the leavings of her luncheon before we get off yet.”

“Why? Don’t you believe what she says!”

“I believe she believes it. I have not much faith in Snowball’s rosy predictions.”

“But it seems likely enough,” says the perplexed Johnny. Père Louis will search for us high and low, and——”

“Ay, if Père Louis is at home. Half the time, as you know, he is away on missions in the outlying parishes. And July and August are his mission months. I am positive he is not in town.”

Johnny stands blankly, his new-born hopes knocked from under him at one fell blow. To Père Louis all things are possible—wanting him, Ma’am Weesy and old Tim, the light-house keeper, are but rickety reeds.

“For which reason,” continues Rene, the relentless, “you had better tell Snowball to keep the contents of the basket for herself. I want none of it, at least.”

The dusk face, fine as a cameo, looks at this moment as if cut in adamant. Snowball glancing across, thinks she has never before seen Rene look so hatefully cross.

There is a long pause; the brothers stand and gaze far and vainly over the sea, Johnny with the old patient, wistful light in his most beautiful eyes, Rene with knitted brows, and dark, stern, resolute gaze.

“It’s an awful go!” says Johnny, at last, under his breath. “I wish you wouldn’t be so tremendously hard on Snowball, though. She couldn’t help it. It isn’t fair, by George! You make the poor little thing feel miserable, Rene. She was crying her eyes out a little while ago.”

“Let her cry!” savagely.

“She heard every word you said.”

“Let her hear! Too much of her own way will be the ruin of that girl. She is spoiled by over-indulgence. You all pet her—I shall not.”

“No,” says Johnny, turning away, “you will never spoil anybody in that way, I think. What a fellow you are, Rene—as hard as nails.”

With which he goes back, with lagging steps, his newly-lit hopes ruthlessly snuffed out. He feels himself a sort of shuttlecock between these two belligerent battledoors, and would lose his temper if he knew how. Fortunately, John Macdonald out of temper is a sight no mortal eye has ever yet seen—so he only looks a trifle blank and rueful, as he returns to Snowball now.

“Well,” that small maiden demands, imperiously, “he wouldn’t come?”

“No,” slowly, “he wouldn’t come.”

“Of course he wouldn’t!” in a rising key; “it’s exactly like him. I think if Rene ever does a good-natured thing the novelty will be the death of him. Now, why wouldn’t he come?”

“Oh—he says he’s not hungry. He says to eat it yourself. Now, Snowball, don’t nag—I’ve had enough of it—let a fellow have some peace, can’t you. I haven’t done anything.”

“What else does he say?” with pursed-up lips and brightening eyes.

“He says that Père Louis is away on missions, and may not be home when Weesy gets there. He says you’ll be hungry enough to want that cake you’re crumbling all to pieces, maybe, before you get another.”

“Have one, Johnny?” says Snowball, politely, tendering one of those confections.

But Johnny shakes his head gloomily, and declines.

“Keep it for yourself. He won’t touch anything but berries, he says—no more will I. Eat it yourself—or better still, keep it for your breakfast to-morrow.”

Without a word, mademoiselle puts back cakes, pie, sandwiches, etcetera, in the basket, covers these provisions with exaggerated care, then sits down a little way off, her sailor hat tilted well over her nose, her hands folded in her lap. So she sits for a long time, Johnny extended in a melancholy attitude on the grass near by. So long she sits indeed, that his suspicions are awakened; he rises on his elbow and peers under the hat. Big, silent tears are raining down—big, clear, globular drops, chasing each other, and falling almost with a plash!—they look large enough—on the folded hands.”

“Hallo!” cries Master John, taken aback, you ain’t at it again, are you. What is there to cry for now?”

Silence—deeper sobs—bigger tears.

“Say—can’t you,” fretfully. “I wish you wouldn’t. You never used to be a cry-baby, Snowball. Stop it, can’t you. What’s the matter now?”

“Johnny!” a great sob. “Jo-ohn-ny!” another.

“Yes,” says Johnny, “all right. What?”

“Jo-ohnny I—I hate Rene!”

The vindictive emphasis with which this is brought out, staggers pacific Johnny. There is a pause.

“Oh! I say. You mustn’t, you know. Not that there is any love lost,” sotto voce.

“I—I,” increase of sobbing, “I always did hate him. I always shall. I would like to get a boat, and go away, and leave him here forever, and ever, and ever!”

“By George !” And then, all at once, Johnny throws himself back on the furze, and laughs long and loudly.

“So,” he gasps, “it is crying with rage you are, after all. Wasn’t it Dr. Johnson who liked a good hater? He ought to have known Snowball Macdonald.”

“My name isn’t Macdonald; I wouldn’t have a name he”—-ferociously pointing—”has! If ever I get off this horrid, abominable place, Johnny, do you know what I mean to do?”

“Not at present,” returns Johnny, who is immensely amused. “Something tremendous, I guess. What?”

“I mean to write to Mr. Farrar, Monsieur Paul, to come and take me away. I belong to him—he brought me here. I wish he hadn’t now. Anywhere would be better than where he is. And I’ll go away, and I’ll never, never, NEVER speak to Rene again!”

All this is, as the reader must know, long anterior to the days of “Pinafore,” else Johnny might have asked just here, with his customary grin, “What, never?” And Snowball, with a relenting inflection, might have safely responded, “Well, hardly ever,” and so truthfully expressed her feelings; for, having reached this powerful climax, and gotten to the very tip-top of the mountain of her indignation, she proceeds, with great rapidity and compunction, to come down.

“Not that I wouldn’t be dreadfully sorry to leave papa, and you, Johnny, and even old Weesy and Tim and Père Louis, and Mère Maddelena, and Soeur Ignatia, and Innocente Desereaux, and—”

“Oh, hold on!” cries Johnny. “That list won’t end until midnight if you name all the people you know. Besides, it will be all no use—you will only waste a sheet of paper and a stamp for nothing. Monsieur Paul will not take you.”

“Why won’t he?” But she asks it as if the assurance were rather a relief.

“Because you don’t belong to him—not really, you know. In point of fact, old girl,” says Johnny, smiling sweetly upon her, “you don’t seem to belong to any one. I guess you sprung up one night somewhere, all by yourself, like a mushroom.”

“I must belong to the people who pay for me,” says Snowball, rather crestfallen, “whoever they are.”

“Yes—whoever they are! I should admire to know. So would you, I dare say. Papa doesn’t—Mr. Farrar may, but he doesn’t tell—only you don’t belong to him, and he won’t take you away. You’re a fixture for life on Isle Perdrix, like old Tim and the lighthouse. When Weesy dies—she can’t go on living forever—and I grow up and get rich, and am captain of a ship, I’ll take you with me as cook. You ain’t half a bad cook Snowball—your apple-dumplings are ‘things to dream of.’ I wish I had a few now.

“Are you hungry, Johnny?” eagerly. “If you are——” Her hand is in the basket in a moment.

“I’m not hungry for anything you have there. No, thanks I won’t take it. You will keep all that for yourself, as Rene says.”

“Johnny,”—in a drooping voice—”please don’t mention Rene. I can’t bear the sound of his name. Oh, dear me!”—a deep, deep, deep sigh—”I don’t see why some people ever were born!”
“What shall I be at fifty,
Should nature keep me alive,
If I find the world so weary
When I am but twenty-five?”
chants Johnny, and laughs. It is a physical impossibility for this boy to remain despondent. After a fashion, he is trying to enjoy being shipwrecked on the top of this big, bare mountain. Rene glances round in wonder at the singing and laughing.

“Would anything make these two serious for five minutes?” he thinks, with a contemptuous shrug. “Singing! and they may never leave this hideous desert alive.”

“Let us sing some more,” says Snowball, waking up promptly to badness. “Rene looks as if he didn’t like it. Let us sing—let us sing the evening hymn.”

“Pious thought—let us,” laughs Johnny. And so to aggravate further the dark and silent M. Rene, these two uplift their fresh young voices, and send them in unison over the darkening-waters.

“Ave Sanctissima!
We lift our souls to thee,
Ora pro nobis,
‘Tis nightfall on the sea!
Watch us while shadows lie
Far o’er the water spread;
Hear the heart’s lonely sigh—
Thine, ‘.oo, hath bled.”

Snowball glances at her foe. He stands and makes no sign, and his dark thoughtful face is turned away. A little pang of remorse begins to shoot through her, but she finishes her hymn.

“Ora, pro nobis,
The waves must rock our sleep;
Ora, Mater, ora,
Star of the deep!”

“‘Tis nightfall on the sea.” It is indeed nightfall now. The sun has dipped long since into the waters of Bay Chalette, and gone down—the long, star-lit northern twilight is paling to dull drab. The evening wind comes to them with all the chill of the wide Atlantic in its salt breath.

“And you have no wrap,” says Johnny, compassionately. Snowball has shivered involuntarily in her thin dress, and he sees it. He is in blue flannel himself, and is the best provided of the three, Rene being clad in white linen, which he greatly affects in summer time.

“It doesn’t matter,” Snowball answers. “Never mind me.”

But her voice sounds weary, arid she leans spiritlessly enough against the rough bole of a big tamarack.

“Suppose you lie down, and take a nap,” suggests Johnny, “it will rest you, and it’s of no use sitting up. We’re in for it to-night, anyhow—better luck to-morrow. I’ll fix you a bed before it gets any darker.”

But there is nothing much to “fix,” as he finds. There is only the dry, rough furze, and long marsh grass and hard penitential branches of spruce and cedar. With these he does the best he can; he piles up the furze, strews it with the long tough grass, twists the little spruce branches into a sort of arbor, and the best he can do is done.

“There you are,” he says, “there’s a bed and board for you. Rosamond’s Bower—Boffin’s Bower—not to be named in the same day. Turn in, and don’t open your peepers till to-morrow morning. Let us hope it will be your last, as well as your first night, camping out. I’ll go and shake up Rene, before he is transmogrified into the rock against which he has leaned so long. Good night, young ‘un!”

“Good-night, Johnny,” responds Snowball falteringly.

She is afraid, but she would die rather than say so. Afraid of snakes, of bears, of ghosts, of the wind in the tree-tops, the sound of the sea, the awful silence, and loneliness, and majesty of night.

She creeps into her bower, but sits peering out—such a pale, anxious, pretty little face, in the dim starlight.

She can see the boys standing together, and still ever gazing over the bay.

“Will Rene ever stir?” she thinks. “He looks as if he could stand there forever. And how cross he did look. I—wish—I—hadn’t made Rene mad!”

The admission comes reluctantly—even in her own mind, but having made it, she is disposed to descend to still deeper depths of the valley of humiliation.

“It is all my fault—Rene is right—it is always my fault! I must be horrid. I wonder everybody don’t hate me as well as him. Maybe they do, only they don’t like to show it. Yes, I always do want my own way, and make a time if I don’t get it. I give Johnny no peace of his life. I fight with Rene from morning till night. And I don’t belong to anybody—I suppose I am too hateful even for that! I wonder why I ever was born—I wonder if I will always be horrid as long as I live! I wonder,” draggingly, “if—Rene—would forgive me, if—I begged his pardon, and promised never to do it any more?”

The “it” is rather vague, but in Snowball’s penitent mind, it stands for all the enormities of her life, too many to be particularized, so she “lumps” them! The brothers meantime stand, with that seaward gaze, that takes in the blue black world of waters.

The night wind sighs around them, the surf laps, with a hoarse, ceaseless moan and wash, over the sunken surf, far below. Rene is very pale in the light of the stars.

“You look used up already, old chap,” Johnny says; “take a snooze, why don’t you, and forget it. It’s no use fretting. Sorrow may abide for a night, but joy cometh with the morning! Something like that was Père Louis’ text last Sunday. It fits in now, I think—make a meditation on it, old man, and cheer up!”

“If we get off before our father comes home I shall not care,” returns Rene, moodily; “it is that that worries me, Johnny!”

“Oh! we will—never fear. We are sure to get off to-morrow—something tells me so. Don’t cross your bridges before you come to them. Turn in like a good fellow, and let us try to forget it. I’m as sleepy as the duse!”

A great yawn indorses the statement. Rene glances behind him.

“What have you done with Snowball?”

“Rigged her up as well as I was able. Twisted some boughs to break the wind, and gathered moss and grass for a bed. It’s the best I could do.”

“Has she had anything to eat?”

“Wouldn’t eat anything when you wouldn’t,” says Johnny, maliciously; “nearly cried her eyes out into the bargain. Feels pretty badly, let me tell you, about the way you take it. Now don’t say again serves her right! It doesn’t.”

“I am not going to say it. She must not be foolish, however; if she wants to be friends with me she must eat what there is left to-morrow morning. We boys are responsible for her. We must take care of her to—to the last.”

“That means until we are taken off! Of course we will,” says hopeful Johnny; “now let us turn in and go to sleep.”

“Turn in—where?”

“Oh, anywhere. You pays your money, and you takes your choice. All the beds in the ‘hôtel de la belle étoile‘ are at our service. Here is mine. A demain; good-night.”

“Good-night,” responds Rene, and looks at his brother almost in envy.

Johnny has thrown himself down just where he stood, and in less than a minute seems to be sound asleep. But it is a long time before Rene follows; he sits there beside his big rock, his face still faithfully turned seaward, his head resting against its mossy side, his eyes closed.

The night is far advanced; it is long past midnight, indeed, and he is half asleep, half awake, when a light chill touch falls on his hand, and awakes him with a great nervous start. A slim figure, with loosely blowing hair, pale, pleading face and pathetic eyes stands by his side.

“Rene!”—a pause—” Rene!” tremulously. “Dear Rene! forgive me.”

“Snowball! You! I thought you were asleep hours ago.”

“I could not sleep, Rene! I am sorry!”—a suppressed sob. “I know I’m horrid. I don’t wonder you hate me. It does serve me right. Nothing is too bad to happen to me! It’s all my fault. I—I—I’m awfully sorry, Rene!”

“Snowball—”

“I want you to forgive me,” in a sobbing whisper. “Oh! Rene, don’t be mad! I—I—can’t help being hateful, but I’ll try. Oh! I mean to try ever so hard after this. I’ll never contradict you again! I’ll do every thing you say! Only I can’t bear you to be angry with me” (great sobbing here, sternly repressed, for slumbering Johnny’s sake). “Oh! Rene, forgive me! ”

“Snowball! you dear little soul!”

And all in a moment, obdurate Rene melts, and puts his arms around her, and gives her a hearty, forgiving, fraternal smack—the first kiss he had ever favored her with, in his life. Perhaps the hour, the scene, the loneliness, have something to do with it. It opens the full floodgates of Snowball’s tears; she puts her arms around his neck, and cries on his shoulder, until that portion of his raiment is quite damp through. Conducts herself generally, in short, for the space of five minutes, like a juvenile Niobe. Then she recovers. Rene has had enough of it, and rather lifts his lovely burden off his neck.

“There, now, Snowball, don’t cry any more; it’s all right; I’m not angry. I don’t know that it was your fault, much, after all. Go back, and try to sleep. You’ll be fit for nothing to-morrow, if you spend the night crying like this.”

And thus in the “dead waste and middle of the night,” peace is proclaimed, and next morning, to his great amazement, Johnny finds the twain he has left mortal foes the night before, excellent friends in the morning. He is puzzled, but thankful, and accepts the fact without too many questions. Only Snowball nearly has a relapse when she finds neither of the boys will touch the hoarded remains of the basket, and propose to sustain existence on berries.

“Then the things may go uneaten!” she is beginning vehemently, “I shan’t touch them !”

Rene looks at her.

“Is this your promise of last night?” the severe young eyes demand. And mademoiselle’s head droops, and her hand goes into the basket, and she swallows a lump in her throat, and—the last of the sandwiches.

The morning is fine—promises to equal yesterday in sunshine and warmth, and keeps its promise. But it is a long day—a long, long, weary day. They lie about listlessly, pick berries, talk in a perfunctory fashion; even Snowball’s fine flow of tittle-tattle flags. Rene reads; Johnny ties to rig a fishing line and catch something, but fails. He reclines at Snowball s feet mostly, and lets her tell him stories—sea stories, if she knows any. All her life she has been an omnivorous reader, devouring everything that has come in her way. Her repertoire, therefore, is considerable. She sings to him, too. Johnny always likes to hear her sing. She feels it a point of honor to keep her boys’ spirits up. It is all her fault, but they are here; that fact keeps well upper most in her mind, and she does her poor little best. It is easy enough with Johnny, who is cheery and sanguine by nature; but Rene looks so pale, so troubled, sits so silent, so grave, it is depressing only to look at him.

The long day wears on. Afternoon comes, and evening, and night, and still no boat, no rescue. Still nothing but the hollow, monotonous moan of the sea, the whistling of the wind, the whispering of the branches, the white flash of a sea-gull’s wing, the circling swoop of a fish-hawk—and far off, far, far off, white sails, that never draw near.

The stars shine out, a little, slim new moon cuts. sharply and cleanly the blue waste of sky, and a second night finds these castaway mariners high and dry on top of Chapeau Dieu.