"Speakin' 'bout air--I can't see much difference 'twixt good air most anywheres. Take it, now, up in New England, up north where I was raised, you can't get better nowheres. Thet comes drorrin' through the mountains and acrosst the Lake, an' it can't be beat." I made no reply for I feared he would ask me if I knew "New England up north". He turned to look at me, evidently surprised at my short silence. He saw that I was being jolted about on the broad back seat, owing to the uneven road. "Sho! If I did n't have the trunk, I 'd put you here on the front seat 'longside of me to kinder steady you." "How far is it to the Seigniory of Lamoral, Mr.--?" I ventured to ask, hoping for a flood of information about the Seigniory and its occupants. "Call me Cale," he said shortly; "thet 's short fer Caleb, an' what all the Canucks know me by. Mis' Macleod, she ain't but jest come to it; she balked consider'ble at fust, but it rolls off'n her tongue now without any Scotch burr, I can tell you! You was askin' 'bout the Seigniory of Lamoral--I dunno jest what to say. The way we 're proceedin' now it's 'bout an hour from here, but with some hosses it might take a half, an' by boat you can make it as long as you 're a mind ter." "It's a large place?" "Thet depends on whether you 're talkin' 'bout the old manor or the Seigniory; one I can show you in ten minutes, t' other in about three days." He turned and looked at me again with his small keen gray eyes. "Where was _you_ raised?" He spoke carelessly enough; but I knew my own. He was simulating indifference, and I put him off the track at once. "I was born in New York City." "Great place--New York." He chirrupped to the colts, and we drove for the next fifteen minutes without further conversation. The boat, owing to heavy freight, was an hour late in leaving Montreal, and two hours longer than its usual time, in discharging it at a dozen hamlets and villages along the St. Lawrence. In consequence, it was sunset when we left the landing-place, and the twilight was deepening to-night, as we turned away from the river road and drove a short distance inland. Once Caleb drew rein to light a lantern, and summon Pete from the back of the coach to sit beside him and hold it. It grew rapidly dark. Leaning from the open upper half of the coach door, I could just see between the trees along the roadside, a sheet of water. "Hola!" Cale shouted suddenly with the full power of his lungs. "Hola--hola!" It was echoed by Pete's shrill prolonged "Ho--la-a-a-a-a!" "Ho-la! Ho!" came the answer from somewhere across the water. Cale turned and looked over his shoulder. "Thet 's the ferry. We ferry over a piece here; it's the back water of a crick thet makes in from the river 'long here, fer 'bout two mile." He turned into a narrow lane, dark under the trees, and drove to the water's edge.