were it not for his wide-spread
reputation of angelic inoffensiveness.

The ride which Melicent had arranged and in which she held out such
promises of a "lark" proved after all but a desultory affair. For with
Fanny making but a sorry equestrian debut and Hosmer creeping along at
her side; Therese unable to hold Beauregard within conventional
limits, and Melicent and Gregoire vanishing utterly from the scene,
sociability was a feature entirely lacking to the excursion.

"David, I can't go another step: I just can't, so that settles it."

The look of unhappiness in Fanny's face and attitude, would have moved
the proverbial stone.

"I think if you change horses with me, Fanny, you'll find it more
comfortable, and we'll turn about and go home."

"I wouldn't get on that horse's back, David Hosmer, if I had to die
right here in the woods, I wouldn't."

"Do you think you could manage to walk back that distance then? I can
lead the horses," he suggested as a _pis aller_.

"I guess I'll haf to; but goodness knows if I'll ever get there
alive."

They were far up on the hill, which spot they had reached by painfully
slow and labored stages, each refraining from mention of a discomfort
that might interfere with the supposed enjoyment of the other, till
Fanny's note of protest.

Hosmer cast about him for some expedient that might lighten the
unpleasantness of the situation, when a happy thought occurred to him.

"If you'll try to bear up, a few yards further, you can dismount at
old Morico's cabin and I'll hurry back and get the buggy. It can be
driven this far anyway: and it's only a short walk from here through
the woods."

So Hosmer set her down before Morico's door: her long riding skirt,
borrowed for the occasion, twisting awkwardly around her legs, and
every joint in her body aching.

Partly by pantomimic signs interwoven with a few French words which he
had picked up within the last year, Hosmer succeeded in making himself
understood to the old man, and rode away leaving Fanny in his care.

Morico fussily preceded her into the house and placed a great clumsy
home-made rocker at her disposal, into which she cast herself with
every appearance of bodily distress. He then busied himself in tidying
up the room out of deference to his guest; gathering up the scissors,
waxen thread and turkey feathers which had fallen from his lap in his
disturbance, and laying them on the table. He knocked the ashes from
his corn