"I will stay here to-morrow," I said stupidly, and when she said that
she was glad, it did not seem to me that she meant it. I saw her no
more that night.
But with the fresh morning I forgot all chill. We lingered over a
breakfast of broiled bass, and the woman showed me a canoe that Simon
had made for her. Simon was the deft-fingered member of my crew, and
he had fashioned a fairy craft. I saw that it would carry two, and I
said to the woman that we would take it, and have a day of idleness
together. I feared she might demur, but she did not. Indeed, she
suddenly laughed out like a child without much reason, and there was
that in the sound that satisfied me, until I swore at the men and their
blundering to keep down my own joy.
We took materials for lunch and started before the dew was dry. The
woman showed me her new skill with the paddle, and I praised her
without care for my conscience. We went slowly and we talked much.
Yet we talked only of the birds and the woods and the paddling. Never
of ourselves.
At noon we landed in a pocket of an inlet on the south side of the cove
toward its mouth. There was a wonderful meadow there with tiger lilies
burning like blood and a giant sycamore leaning to the water.
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