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12 thither, tending the flax, gathering the thread, adjusting this and smoothing that, while all the while she crooned the old ballad.

Her patience beat him at length.

"You know I'm here," he whispered.

"Ah, Antoine, I knew your tread."

"Antoine! " exclaimed Denys with an angry start, "what do you mean by that, Lucette?"

The wheel stopped and she looked round, her face a pretty mask of coquettish surprise and her eyes beaming with mischief.

"So, it is not Antoine!" with just a suggestion of disappointment in the tone, a little shrug of the shapely shoulders, and a pout. "Only you. I thought you were gone for ever."

"You will drive me away, if you treat me like this. What did you mean about knowing Antoine's tread?"

For a second she let her roguish eyes rest on his, and then she smiled.

"His feet are so big and so clumsy," she said, and turned again to her wheel.

"Do you mean you meet him so often you can recognize them?"

"Recognize them! Mon Dieu, they are not feet to forget when once seen," she cried lightly.

"You can't pass it off like that, Lucette. Were you expecting him here this afternoon? Is that what you mean?" He was still angry and his tone very earnest.

"I didn't expect you, Monsieur Catechist."

"And you meant to amuse yourself with him in my absence?"

She turned and made a pretty grimace of dismay and spread out her hands.

"Is it an hour since you said you would never speak to me again? What then does it matter to you? Would you play the dog in the manger?"