The tongue-shaped piece over the instep is
of white fawnskin heavily ornamented in five colours of silk. Where it
joins the foot of the slipper it is worked over and over into a narrow
cord of red and blue silk. The edge about the ankle is turned over,
deeply scalloped, and bound at the top with a broad band of blue silk
stitched with pink. Two tiny blue bows at either side the ankle
ornament the front. Altogether a most magnificent foot-gear. No word
accompanied them, apparently, but after some search I drew a bit of
paper from the toe of one of them. It was inscribed simply--"Fort la
Cloche."
XI.
THE HABITANTS.
During my absence Dick had made many friends. Wherein lies his secret I
do not know, but he has a peculiar power of ingratiation with people
whose lives are quite outside his experience or sympathies. In the
short space of four days he had earned joyous greetings from every one
in town. The children grinned at him cheerfully; the old women cackled
good-natured little teasing jests to him as he passed; the pretty,
dusky half-breed girls dropped their eyelashes fascinatingly across
their cheeks, tempering their coyness with a smile; the men painfully
demanded information as to artistic achievement which was evidently as
well meant as it was foreign to any real thirst for knowledge they
might possess; even the lumber-jacks addressed him as "Bub." And withal
Dick's methods of approach were radically wrong, for he blundered upon
new acquaintance with a beaming smile, which is ordinarily a sure
repellent to the cautious, taciturn men of the woods.
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