once more--"well, then, it would be more hard, I suppose, to give it
up not easily. And then, for the house, we shall build a new one
this fall; the neighbours will help. And for the voyage to Quebec--
without that we may be happy. And as regards the little orphan, I
will tell you frankly"--here he went back to his seat upon the flat
stone, and settled himself with an air of great comfort beside his
partner--"I tell you, in confidence, Angelique demands that I
prepare a particular furniture at the new house. Yes, it is a
cradle; but it is not for an orphan."



IV

It was late in the following summer when I came back again to St.
Gerome. The golden-rods and the asters were all in bloom along the
village street; and as I walked down it the broad golden sunlight of
the short afternoon seemed to glorify the open road and the plain
square houses with a careless, homely rapture of peace. The air was
softly fragrant with the odour of balm of Gilead. A yellow warbler
sang from a little clump of elder-bushes, tinkling out his contented
song like a chime of tiny bells, "Sweet--sweet--sweet--sweeter--
sweeter--sweetest!"

There was the new house, a little farther back from the road than
the old one; and in the place where the heap of ashes had lain, a
primitive garden, with marigolds and lupines and zinnias all abloom.
And there was Patrick, sitting on the door-step, smoking his pipe in
the cool of the day. Yes; and there, on a many-coloured counterpane
spread beside him, an infant joy of the house of Mullarkey was