Page:Delight - de la Roche - 1926.djvu/161

 "You won't tell a soul you saw me?" urged Delight.

"Never a word, except I seen the boy a-trundling the barrow with your box on it to the station and you after it with your basket."

"And you'll tell Mr. Heaslip not to say I'm working for him?"

"Never fear him. He's the greatest man to hold his tongue you ever seen. Now, look you, Miss What's-yr-name, this Canada's a great place for opportoonities. You might walk along a country road 'ere, alone in the world, and in the first house you'd stop at to ask for a drink, you'd meet someone who'd want you as a partner for life. You can pick up a mate in no time."

"But I don't want to get married."

He had a pull from the bottle of tea and then observed:

"Well, if you like the single life—same as I do—your own boss, your own bedfellow, and no one to dash cold water on your gladness, it's a great country for that, too, for you've any hamount of chance for adventure. I travels light. I've been livin' in a little shack outside Mistwell three years. Three winters in a little shack on four posts, covered with tar-paper. . . . I may want to move on tomorrow. Wot do I do? I gets a few dollars for my old shack, a few more for my old nag, and I 'eaves the old cart in the river. You won't catch me putting my neck in a yoke."

"Nor me, neither."

"Well, you stick to Heaslips. They have no daughter and they might take a fancy to you and adopt you as their own if you're a good, willing girl, and fall in with their plans. . . . Now we'd better be movin' on. I'd like to spend a silly hour with you on the bank of this stream but I can't afford to do it 'cause my fish'ud go bad on me, so come along, my girl."