Part 26

Farr entered by the kitchen door and stood there, looking in with some confusion on the girl and child.

“It is only Zelie Dionne; she is my boarder,” the woman informed him. “She is a good girl and she has the very nice job in the cloth-hall of the big Haxton mill. She lives with me because I was neighbor of her good folks in the Tadousac country, so far away from here in our Canada. Come! I make you acquaint. You shall see. She is a good girl!”

Zelie Dionne rose and acknowledged the introduction with a French girl's pretty grace. A bit of a flush lighted the dusky pallor of her cheeks when Farr bent before her. The bow in her hair was cocked with true Gallic chic and her gown was crisply smart in its simplicity. Her big, dark eyes were the wonderful feature of her face, and Farr looked into them and seemed to lose a bit of his cool self-possession; he faltered in speech, groping for words in the first commonplaces.

“You must talk together. I must work,” said the good woman. She hurried back into her kitchen.

The child ran to Farr and climbed upon his knees.

“You have been good to Rosemarie. I thank you,” he said. “I suppose the good woman has told you how it has happened.”

“Yes, when I came at noon.” Her tones were peculiarly sweet and compassionate. A touch of accent gave piquancy to what she said. She looked at him meaningly. “I have been talking to our little Rosemarie and she will not cry any more for her good mamma who has gone up to the green hills because she is sick and must rest. So Rosemarie will be patient and live here and I will be play-mamma.”

“Yes, play-mamma,” agreed the child. “Good play-mamma! Two mammas! But only one papa!” She put up her arms and tucked them about his neck and snuggled down with a happy sense of complete understanding of his protection. At last, so it seemed to her, she had recovered the father she had never known. Poor, little, caged bird, her release from that lonely prison was dated in her happy consciousness from his appearance in the doorway, and all things had been well for her after he came--sunlight, the trees, the blue sky, and tender care, and the companionship of human beings. Therefore, the rush of a love her child's comprehension could not analyze had gone out to him.

Farr returned with significance the look Zelie Dionne's dark eyes gave him.

“I found the note. It made me go a-meddling. It left a legacy to somebody--and I accepted--without understanding why I did so.” He stroked the child's curls.

“I did not understand at first--when Madame Maillet told me,” she confessed, with a smile. “Old Etienne came at noon to tell her and she has told it to me. It is very sad--but yet it is comical when I look at you. But as I look at you I understand better. You have a good heart. I can see!”

“I am only a strolling stranger--here to-day and there to-morrow,” protested Farr. “I think the heat must have affected my head. It has been very warm lately. But when I saw her--” He choked suddenly.

“Oh, it is easy to understand,” said the girl, reassuringly. A mist of tears came across her big eyes, though her mouth did not lose the wistful smile. “The poor folks help one another--and they understand.”

“It wouldn't be right to give her to an orphanage,” insisted Farr. “She has missed too much already. Of course I don't pretend to know what a little girl needs--but I am willing to be told.”

“I will tell you and I will help.”

“I think old Etienne and I need you in the partnership--as adviser. I thank you.”

Then came the old Canadian, his wrinkled face tender with solicitous interest, and he chuckled when he welcomed the new member of the firm.

“Ah, Mam'selle Zelie she shall help us the very much in what we do not know,” he informed the young man, and continued, while the dark eyes flashed protest: “I am of the Tadousac country, and she is a good girl, for I have know her all the years since I trot her on my knee when she much small as the petite Rosemarie. I can tell you how she dance down the meadows in the ring-a-rosy play and how she--”

“Phut! Your tongue is as long as your rake and it goes reaching down into other folks' affairs, old Etienne! What cares this strange gentleman for what happened in Tadousac? Go use your key instead of your tongue. Unlock your little door so that Rosemarie may walk on the cool grass beside the canal.”

The old man grinned and started away.

“We're going out where the birds will sing good night to you,” Farr told the child and lifted her off his knees. But at the door she stopped and turned to Zelie Dionne, who had not risen.

“Come, play-mamma!”

“I will wait here till you come back, Rosemarie.”

But the child was coaxingly insistent, holding out her hand.

“I think it is because she has been so lonely all her life,” suggested Farr. “Now that she has found friends she wants them to be with her in her little pleasures. May I presume enough to add my invitation to hers?”

She came and the child walked between them, holding their hands.

“One papa and my play-mamma!” she said, looking up at them in turn.

Mother Maillet came to the kitchen door and waved adieu with her dish-towel.