I tried to
be crafty.
"Who did you think I was when you first woke?" I asked, taking my pipe
and preparing to be comfortable.
He pushed back his hair. "Benjamin," he answered vaguely. He was
still half asleep.
"But you told me your name was Benjamin!" I put down my flint and
tinder.
He met my look. "I have a cousin Benjamin, as well," he rejoined. "I
was dreaming of him. Monsieur, I am humiliated to think that I went to
sleep. I have never done so before."
My pipe drew well, and I did not feel like chiding. "It does not
matter," I said, with a yawn. "You must not take it amiss, monsieur,
if I confess that, as a guard, I have never considered you much more
seriously than I would that brown thrush above you. What is your
posy?" and I leaned over and took the flowers from his hand.
He smiled at me drowsily. "The arbutus," he explained, with a
lingering touch of his finger upon the blossoms. "Smell them,
monsieur. I found them in Connecticut last spring. Are they not well
suited to be the first flowers of this wild land? Repellent
without,--see how rough the leaves are to your finger,--but fragrant
and beautiful under its harsh coating. Life in the Colonies grew to
seem to me much the same.
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