rnoon to myself. My lungs were weak,
or Abby thought they were, and the doctor had told her I must not sit
too long over my bench, but must be out in the air as much as might be,
though not at hard labour. Then,--those afternoons, I am saying,--I
would be off like a flash with my fiddle,--off to the yellow sand beach
where the round pebbles lay. I could never let my poor father hear me
play; it was a knife in his heart even to see the Lady; and these hours
on the beach were my comfort, and kept the spirit alive in me. Looking
out to sea, I could still feel my mother Marie beside me, still hear her
voice singing, so gay, so sad,--singing all ways, as the wind blows. She
had no voice like yours, Melody, my dear, but it was small and sweet as
a bird's; sweet as a bird's! It was there, on the yellow sand beach,
that I first met Father L'Homme-Dieu, the priest.

I have told you a great deal about this good man, Melody. He came of old
French stock, like ourselves,--like most of the people in our village;
only his people had always been Catholics. His village, where he had a
little wooden church, was ten or twelve miles from ours, but he was the
only priest for twenty miles round, and he rode or walked long
distances, visiting the scattered families that belonged to his
following. He chanced to come to the beach one day when I was there, and
stayed to hear me play. I never knew he was there till I turned to go
home; but then he spoke to me, and asked about my music and my home, and
talked so kindly and wisely that my heart went out to him that very
hour. He took to me, too; he was a lonely man, and there was none in his
own neighbourhood that he cared to make his friend; and seldom a week
passed that he did not find his way to the beach, for an hour of music
and talk. Talk! How we did talk! There was always a book in his pocket,
too, and he would read some fine passage aloud, and then we would
discuss it, and turn it over and over, and let it draw our own thoughts
like a magnet. It was a rare chance for a country boy, Melody! Here was
a scholar, and as fine a gentleman as ever I met, and the heart of a
child and a wise man melted into one; and I like his own son for the
kindness he gave me. Sometimes I went to his house, but not often, for I
could not take so long a time away from my work. He lived in a little
house like a bird's house, and the little brown woman who did for him
was like a bird, and of all curious things, her n