"Oh, no, indeed, far from that;" and Martine's emphasis showed how deeply she meant what she said.

At this moment they had reached their own door and the last good-byes had to be said.

"I cannot come again this evening," Balfour explained, "but I'll see you for a moment at the train."

Then, thrusting his hand into his pocket, with an exclamation he drew out a small object that he held toward Martine. "I had almost forgotten, but if you would take this," he cried, "for your collection, I would be so pleased. It's in a better condition than most things they dig up;"

and as Martine took it, she saw that it was a small trowel, remarkably bright, yet of a curious shape.

"Another Acadian relic. How kind you are!"

"This fork is for you, Miss Redmond. Even if you have not a collection, it will interest you. The trowel," Balfour continued, "was almost as bright as this when it was dug up, it had been buried so deep, and the fork is of an odd shape. Of course they haven't any great value," he concluded, "only they are genuine relics, as I know, for I dug them up myself. I might have brought you a gridiron with a long handle and four feet, but you would have found some difficulty in carrying it about, and the little spade can be carried in your travelling-bag for use in mending a broken d.y.k.e, or shaping bricks, if you happen to wish to mend or build on the way. That at least was its original use, and the fork--well, you can find many uses for it;" and he turned from Martine to Amy.

Both girls found it hard to bid good-bye to Balfour. In spite of the shortness of their acquaintance he was already an old friend, one whose friendship they particularly valued.

"How sensible he is," sighed Martine, as they went indoors, "and to think that he's only a year older than Taps!"

"A year older than--who?" asked Amy, thinking that she must have misunderstood. "What did you say?"

"Oh, nothing--really nothing," replied Martine, hastily, with a heightened color. "I was only thinking that Balfour Airton seems so very much older than most boys of his age, and he knows so much more than most students." Martine's words were hurried and nervous, and Amy decided that she was more disturbed than she had expected her to be at parting with her Annapolis friends.

But if Amy only suspected Martine's feelings, she had no difficulty in deciding how Priscilla felt. She and Eunice had formed a most romantic attachment for each other, and made no effort to hide the tears that fell freely as they bade good-bye at the station. At the final parting each threw her arms around the other's neck, and the bystanders tried not to laugh when Eunice in her emotion knocked off Priscilla's hat and entangled the cord of her eyegla.s.ses in Priscilla's belt. But the bystanders, if amused, were sympathetic, consisting as they did chiefly of Dr. and Mrs. Gray, Balfour, and Mrs. Airton, and one or two other friends whom the travellers had met during their weeks in Annapolis.

"Your tears, my dear Eunice," said Dr. Gray, "exactly express the feelings of all the rest of us; and while we wish you, Mrs. Redmond, a safe journey, it is perhaps not too selfish to hope that you and the young ladies may look back to Annapolis as the brightest spot on the map of your travels."

"Indeed, we shall," said Mrs. Redmond, cordially, "and--"

"All aboard!" called the conductor; "Good-bye," shouted Balfour; "Write soon," sighed Eunice.

"Come back next summer," cried Dr. Gray.

"Perhaps sooner," responded Amy, and with a puff and a shriek the "Flying Bluenose" glided off toward the real land of Evangeline.

CHAPTER XV

WITH PREJUDICE

"Priscilla," said Amy, as they finished breakfast on their first morning at Wolfville, "you are no longer homesick."

"Did I say I was homesick?"

"Perhaps not in words, though you have looked it a great many times. But I noticed a change during our last week in Annapolis; you have seemed perfectly cheerful ever since."

"Oh, I'm sorry," responded the over-conscientious Priscilla, "if I seemed less than cheerful before; it was really very wrong in me, for you and your mother have been so kind, and Martine is so very--" here she hesitated for a moment--"so very lively."

Amy smiled at Priscilla's earnestness.

"To most persons you would have seemed perfectly cheerful, but little things have shown me that your heart was not wholly with us."

"That was only because I had never before been altogether away from my family. But if there has been any change lately, it has been on account of Eunice. She seems to me the most sensible person I have ever known, and I hope that she can carry out her plan of going to college. If papa had lived I could have done something for her, but now I can't make any promises for the future, because mamma says that we shall have to be very careful about spending for a few years."

"I'm glad, however," responded Amy, "that you have this interest in Eunice, even if you cannot do all that you would like to do for her; it is rather curious that each of us should have found a protege in the course of our travels; Yvonne, Pierre, and Eunice, each one so unlike the others, and yet all of them rather interesting."

"Martine, of course, can accomplish the most," and Priscilla sighed. "I imagine that her father and mother never say 'no' to her."

"Money isn't everything," replied Amy, "and you and I can do more or less for Eunice and Pierre in spite of the fact that time and thought are the most we can give. I have often noticed that the person who has a real interest in the welfare of some one else can really accomplish things in better ways than by spending money."

"Balfour wouldn't let any one spend much money on Eunice; he is so very independent, and wishes always to stand on his own feet. I never saw any one just like him."

"I agree with you, Priscilla, and I feel that we owe much to him for all he did for us in Annapolis; besides, he has given mother one or two letters to people in Wolfville, so that I fancy we shall be somewhat indebted to him here."

A few moments later Amy, in her little bedroom, reread a letter received from Fritz that morning. Its tone was so cheerful that it ought to have had an exhilarating effect on her; on the contrary, she was now less happy than before she received it. Fritz and his friend had already reached Chester on the east coast, and he wrote most enthusiastically of the charms of this little watering-place. Not one word of regret did he utter now over his separation from Mrs. Redmond's party. His time was apparently fully occupied with boating and driving excursions and other pleasures of the conventional summer resort. One sentence only, at the end, suggested that he had not forgotten what he had previously said to Amy.

"I am surprised that you have travelled so comfortably, with not a single accident to interfere with your pleasure; but if anything disagreeable should happen, then perhaps you will wish that you had some stronger person to help you out of your difficulty."

With a sigh Amy laid the letter in her bureau drawer, and as she did so her eye fell on an envelope addressed to Martine. Evidently she had picked it up with her own letters when she had brought them upstairs.

The envelope was empty and hardly worth returning, but as she took it to drop into the waste basket, she looked, as one will, at the postmark. To her surprise, it was the same, "Chester," as on her own letter from Fritz. Then her mind flew back to the morning at Yarmouth, when she thought she had seen Martine wheeling down the side street with an unknown youth. The inference was now plain--in some way Martine had made the acquaintance of Fritz's friend, and was keeping up a correspondence with him. There was nothing very wrong in this in itself, except that it implied on Martine's part a certain amount of deception. "Taps," as Fritz called him, might have been a perfectly desirable friend for all the girls, and Fritz himself might have introduced him to Martine. She had had no opportunity to meet him on the boat. Yet even had he been an old friend of hers, there seemed to be no reason why she should not speak frankly about him. The discovery of this envelope reconciled Amy completely to Fritz's banishment. It was just as well that he and his friend had been sent off by themselves.

As to Martine, Amy decided that at present it was hardly well to speak to her of the letter, or even mention it to Mrs. Redmond. But for the rest of the day she was less cordial than usual toward Martine, and the young girl felt the change.

When Amy returned to the piazza, where she had left the others, she found only her mother and Martine. In a moment Priscilla joined them, looking bright and happy, and with unusual color in her fair cheeks.

"I've been down the street," she said, "and the town is so attractive that you must all come with me on an exploring tour; I can't tell why, but I feel more at home here than in most places. Wolfville seems less English than Annapolis; in fact, it is more like one of our own New England towns."

"That, I dare say," rejoined Mrs. Redmond, "is partly because it is a college town, but more likely because it was settled by Americans. I have an idea that hardly a Loyalist came here after the Revolution."

"Settled by Americans?" cried Martine. "Wasn't this all French country through here?"

"Yes--once--my dear. You remember, however, that after the French were deported, their lands were granted to colonists from New England. Those who came to this part of Nova Scotia were chiefly from Connecticut, and Wolfville is named for a well-known family of these colonists, named De Wolfe."

"Then this isn't Grand Pre?"

"Oh, no; there is still a Grand Pre two or three miles to the west, with relics and memories without end, of Evangeline and Basil."

"Let us go there, then, as soon as we can," cried Martine.

"Not yet, my dear. We would better first see something nearer at hand; Mr. Knight, Balfour's friend, has offered to drive us to Grand Pre this afternoon, and if this suits you all, I will send him a reply at once."

The three girls, agreeing that they should enjoy the afternoon drive, fell in with Mrs. Redmond's suggestion for a morning walk.

"I have been advised," said Mrs. Redmond, "to take a road behind the college, leading to the top of the ridge, where we can get a fine view of the Gaspereau Valley."

Though it was a steep hill, the view from the summit repaid them by its surpa.s.sing beauty. The deep valley, bordered with trees of varying shades of green, the blue river flowing between, and toward its mouths winding in and out among the marshes, formed a scene long to be remembered.

"If we could see to the very mouth," said Mrs. Redmond, "and bring our imagination into full play, we could picture the poor Acadians gathered in forlorn groups waiting to be dragged away to the English transports.

Their pleasant homes were found all along the sides of this valley, as well as at Grand Pre. Undoubtedly it is Longfellow's poem that has given the latter place its greater prominence."