CHAPTER III.
A ROPE OF SAND Undoubtedly Mademoiselle Gautier was querulous, and equally without doubt she had good reason to be so; but it made it a little dull for Chris.
Accidents would happen, wherever one went, and what was the good of making a fuss?
Of course, every allowance had to be made for poor Mademoiselle in consideration of the fact that she was torn in pieces by the valiant attempt to keep her attention focussed upon three children at once.

The effort had not so far been a brilliant success, and Mademoiselle, conscious within herself of her inability to cope adequately with her threefold responsibility, being moreover worn out by her gallant struggle to do so, was inclined to shortness of temper and a severity of judgment that bordered upon injustice.
If Chris would persist in flying about the shore in that wild fashion with her hair loose--that flaming hair which Mademoiselle considered in itself to be almost indecent--what could be expected but that some _contretemps_ must of necessity arrive?
It was useless for Chris to protest that it was not her hair that had got her into difficulties, that she had only left it loose to dry it after her bathe, that there had been no one to see--at least, no one that mattered--and that the cut on her foot was solely due to the fact that she had taken off her sand-shoes to climb over the rocks.

Mademoiselle only shook her head with pursed lips.
Chris _etait mechante--tres mechante_, and no amount of arguing would make her change her opinion upon that point.
So Chris abandoned argument while the worried little Frenchwoman bathed and bandaged her foot anew.

She would not be able to bathe again for at least a week, and this fact was of itself sufficient to depress her into silence.

Yet, after a little, when Mademoiselle was gone, a cheery little tune rose to her lips.