← catalogue

A Little Girl in Old St. Louis

by Amanda M. Douglas · English · Gutenberg #41526 · 511,537 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Little Girl in Old St. Louis
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: A Little Girl in Old St. Louis

Author: Amanda M. Douglas


        
Release date: December 1, 2012 [eBook #41526]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/41526

Credits: E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A LITTLE GIRL IN OLD ST. LOUIS ***

A LITTLE GIRL IN OLD ST. LOUIS

by

AMANDA M. DOUGLAS

Author of “A Little Girl in Old Boston,” “A Little Girl in Old Detroit,”
“A Little Girl in Old Washington,” etc.







New York
Dodd, Mead & Company
1903

Copyright, 1903.
By Dodd, Mead and Company.

Published, September, 1903.

Burr Printing House,
New York.




CONTENTS
    CHAPTER I—RENÉE DE LONGUEVILLE
    CHAPTER II—OLD ST. LOUIS
    CHAPTER III—A NEW HOME
    CHAPTER IV—THE SOWING OF A THORN
    CHAPTER V—WITH A TOUCH OF SORROW
    CHAPTER VI—BY THE FIRESIDE
    CHAPTER VII—AT THE KING’S BALL
    CHAPTER VIII—THE SURPRISE
    CHAPTER IX—PRISONERS
    CHAPTER X—IN THE WILDERNESS
    CHAPTER XI—WAS EVER WELCOME SWEETER
    CHAPTER XII—HER ANSWER
    CHAPTER XIII—PASSING YEARS
    CHAPTER XIV—AT THE BALL
    CHAPTER XV—GATHERING THISTLES
    CHAPTER XVI—THE RISE IN THE RIVER
    CHAPTER XVII—RIVALS
    CHAPTER XVIII—A FINE ADJUSTMENT
    CHAPTER XIX—THIS WAY AND THAT
    CHAPTER XX—WHEN A WOMAN WILL
    CHAPTER XXI—FROM ACROSS THE SEA
    CHAPTER XXII—A NEW ST. LOUIS




  Cities that have grown from small hamlets seldom keep register of
  their earlier days, except in the legends handed down in families. St.
  Louis has the curious anomaly of beginning over several times. For the
  earliest knowledge of how the little town looked I wish to express my
  obligations for some old maps and historical points to Mr. Frederick
  M. Crunden, Public Librarian, Miss Katharine I. Moody, and Colonel
  David Murphy.

                                                          A. M. Douglas.




CHAPTER I

RENÉE DE LONGUEVILLE


The bell had clanged and the gates of the stockade were closed. There
were some houses on the outside; there was not so much fear of the
Indians here, for the French had the art of winning them into
friendship. Farms were cultivated, and the rich bottom lands produced
fine crops. Small as the town was twenty years before the eighteenth
century ended, it was the headquarters of a flourishing trade. The
wisdom of Pierre Laclede had laid the foundation of a grand city. The
lead mines even then were profitably worked, and supplied a large tract
of the Mississippi River east and west.

Antoine Freneau stood a few moments in the door of his log hut, down by
the old Mill Creek, listening with his hand to one ear. There were
sounds of spring all about, but he was not heeding them. Then he turned,
closed the door, which was braced on the inner side with some rough iron
bands; fastened it with the hook, and let down a chain. He was seldom
troubled with unexpected evening visitors.

The log hut was hidden at the back with trees enough to form a sort of
grove. It had two rooms. This at the front was a sort of miscellaneous
storehouse. Freneau did quite a trade with the Indians and the boatmen
going up and down the river. There was no real attempt at orderly
store-keeping. Articles were in heaps and piles. One had almost to
stumble over them.

The back room was larger. There was a stone chimney, with a great wide
fireplace, where Freneau was cooking supper. In the far corner was a bed
raised on sawed rounds of logs, with skins stretched over the framework,
on which was a sack of hay with a heap of Indian blankets, just as he
had crawled out of it in the morning. A table and three stools
manufactured by himself; a rude sort of closet, and a curious old
brass-bound chest, now almost black with age, completed the furnishing.
The puncheon floor, in common use at that time, was made with logs split
in the middle and the rounding side laid in a sort of clay plaster that
hardened and made it very durable. The top would get worn smooth
presently. The walls were hung with various trophies and arms of
different kinds. Two windows had battened shutters; one stood a little
way open, and this was on the creek side.

The supper had a savory fragrance. He had baked a loaf of bread on a
heated flat stone, spreading the dough out thin and turning it two or
three times. A dish of corn stewed with salted pork, a certain kind of
coffee compounded of roasted grains and crushed in the hollow of a
stone, gave out a fragrance, and now he was broiling some venison on the
coals.

There were sundry whispers about the old man as to smuggling. Once his
place had been searched, he standing by, looking on and jibing the men
so engaged, turning any apparent mystery inside out for them. Then he
would be gone days at a time, but his house was securely fastened.
Occasionally he had taken longer journeys, and once he had brought back
from New Orleans a beautiful young wife, who died when her baby girl was
born. The nurse had taken it to her home in Kaskaskia. Then it had been
sent to the Sisters’ School at New Orleans. She had been home all one
winter and had her share in the merry making. In the spring her father
took her to Canada, to the great disappointment of hosts of admirers. At
Quebec she was married and went to France. That was ten years ago. He
had grown queer and morose since, and turned miserly.

There was a peremptory thump at the door, and Antoine started, glancing
wildly about an instant, then went through and unfastened the stout
hook. The chain he did not remove: it was about a foot from the floor
and well calculated to trip up any unwary intruder and send him
sprawling face downward.

The night had grown dark, and a mist-like rain had set in. The trees
were beating about in the rising wind.

“Open wide to us, Antoine Freneau! See what I have brought you, if you
can make light enough.”

“Gaspard Denys—is it you? Why, I thought you were in the wilds of
Canada. And——”

He kicked aside the chain and peered over at the small figure beside
Gaspard.

Gaspard had just stood the child down, and his arms tingled with the
strain when the muscles were set loose.

“You have brought her!”

There was a sound in the voice far from welcome, almost anger.

“Yes; your messenger from New Orleans told the truth. The nurse or
companion, whatever you may call her, had instructions, if no one
claimed her, to place her in a convent.”

“And you—you interfered?” Freneau struck his clinched fist hard on a
pile of skins.

Gaspard laughed.

“What I am to do with a child is more than I can tell,” Freneau said
doggedly, almost threateningly.

“Well, you can give us something to eat. Your supper has a grand
fragrance to a hungry man. Then we can discuss the other points. A bear
taken away from his meal is always cross—eh, Antoine?”

Freneau turned swarthy; he was dark, and the red tinge added made him
look dangerous.

“I don’t understand——”

“Well, neither do I. You married your daughter to a French title when
you knew she would have been happier here with a young fellow who loved
her; and—yes, I am sure she loved me. Somewhere back, when my forebears
called themselves St. Denys, there might have been a title in the
family. In this New World we base our titles on our courage, ambitions,
successes. Then her little daughter was born, and she pined away in the
old Château de Longueville and presently died, while her husband was
paying court and compliments to the ladies at the palace of Louis XVII.
There are deep mutterings over in France. And De Longueville, with his
half dozen titles, marries one of Marie Antoinette’s ladies in waiting.
The child goes on in the old château. Two boys are born to the French
inheritance, and little mademoiselle is not worth a rush. She will be
sent to her grandfather somewhere in the province of Louisiana. But the
nurse goes to Canada to marry her lover, expatriated for some cause. You
see, I know it all. If mademoiselle had stayed in France she would have
been put in a convent.”

“The best thing! the best thing!” interrupted the old man irascibly.

“Word was sent to enter her in a convent at Quebec. Well, I have brought
her here. Give us some supper.”

He had been taking off the child’s cap and coat after they entered the
living room. A great flaming torch stood up in one corner of the
chimney, and shed a peculiar golden-red light around the room, leaving
some places in deep shadow. The old man turned his meat, took up his
cake of bread, and put them on the table. Then he went for plates and
knives.

“This is your grandfather, Renée,” Denys said, turning the child to face
him.

The girl shrank a little, and then suddenly surveyed him from his yarn
stockings and doeskin breeches up to his weather-beaten and not
especially attractive face, surmounted by a shock of grizzled hair. She
looked steadily out of large brown eyes. She was slim, with a clear-cut
face and air of dignity, a child of nine or so. Curiously enough, his
eyes fell. He turned in some confusion without a word and went on with
his preparations.

“Let us have some supper. It is not much. Even if I had expected a guest
I could not have added to it.”

“It is a feast to a hungry man. Our dinner was not over-generous.”

Gaspard took one side of his host and placed the little girl opposite
her grandfather. She evinced no surprise. She had seen a good deal of
rough living since leaving old Quebec.

Antoine broke the bread in chunks and handed it to each. The dish of
corn was passed and the venison steak divided.

“After this long tramp I would like to have something stronger than your
home-brewed coffee, though that’s not bad. Come, be a little friendly to
a returned traveller,” exclaimed the guest.

“You should have had it without the asking, Gaspard Denys, if you had
given me a moment’s time. You came down the Illinois, I suppose?”

“To St. Charles. There the boat was bound to hang up for the night. But
Pierre Joutel brought us down in his piroque after an endless amount of
talk. There was a dance at St. Charles. So it was dark when we reached
here. Lucky you are outside the stockade.”

“And you carried me,” said the child, in a clear, soft voice that had a
penetrative sound.

Antoine started. Why should he hear some pleading in the same voice
suddenly strike through the years?

Gaspard poured out a glass of wine. Then he offered the bottle to
Antoine, who shook his head.

“How long since?” asked Gaspard mockingly.

“I do not drink at night.”

“Renée, you are not eating. This corn is good, better than with the
fish. And the bread! Antoine, you could change the name of the town or
the nickname. Go into the baking business.”

Freneau shrugged his shoulders.

Scarcity of flour and bread had at one time given the town the
appellation of Pain Court. Now there were two bakeries, but many of the
settlers made excellent bread. Freneau’s bread cake was split in the
middle and buttered, at least Gaspard helped himself liberally and
spread the child’s piece with the soft, sweet, half-creamy compound.

“You must eat a little of the meat, Renée. You must grow rosy and stout
in this new home.”

The men ate heartily enough. Everything was strange to her, though for
that matter everything had been strange since leaving the old château.
The post-chaise, the day in Paris, the long journey across the ocean,
the city of Quebec with its various peoples, and the other journey
through lakes and over portages. Detroit, where they had stayed two days
and that had appeared beautiful to her; the little towns, the sail down
the Illinois River to the greater one that seemed to swallow it up.

Marie Loubet had said her rich grandfather in the new country had sent
for her, and that her father did not care for her since his sons were
born. Indeed, he scarcely gave her a thought until it occurred to him
that her American-French grandfather was well able to provide for her.
Her mother’s dot had been spent long ago. He wanted to sell the old
château and its many acres of ground, for court living was high, and the
trend of that time was extravagance.

“You had better place your daughter in a convent,” said the amiable
stepmother, who had never seen the little girl but twice. “The boys will
be all we can care for. I hope heaven will not send me any daughters.
They must either have a large dot or striking beauty. And I am sure this
girl of yours will not grow up into a beauty.”

Yet her mother had been beautiful the Count remembered. And he smiled
when he thought of the dower he had exacted from the old trader. No
doubt there was plenty of money still, and this grandchild had the best
right to it. She might like it better than convent life.

Marie’s lover had emigrated two years before, and had sent her money to
pay her passage. Why, it was almost a miraculous opening. So Renée de
Longueville was bundled off to the new country.

And now she sat here, taking furtive glances at her grandfather, who did
not want her. No one in her short life had been absolutely cross to her,
and she was quite used to the sense of not being wanted until she met
Gaspard Denys. Of the relationships of life she knew but little; yet her
childish heart had gone out with great fervor to him when he said, “I
loved your mother. I ought to have married her; then you would have been
my little girl.”

“Why did you not?” she asked gravely. Then with sweet seriousness, “I
should like to be your little girl.”

“You shall be.” He pressed her to his heart, and kissed down amid the
silken curls.

So now she did not mind her grandfather’s objection to her; she knew
with a child’s intuition he did not want her. But she could, she _did_,
belong to Uncle Gaspard, and so she was safe. A better loved child might
have been crushed by the knowledge, but she was always solacing herself
with the next thing. This time it was the first, the very first thing,
and her little heart gave a beat of joy.

Yet she was growing tired and sleepy, child fashion. The two men were
talking about the fur trade, the pelts that had come in, the Indians and
hunters that were loitering about. It had been a long day to her, and
the room was warm. The small head drooped lower with a nod.

There was a pile of dressed skins one side of the room, soft and silken,
Freneau’s own curing.

Gaspard paused suddenly, glanced at her, then rose and took her in his
arms and laid her down on them tenderly. She did not stir, only the rosy
lips parted as with a half smile.

“Yes, tell me what to do with her,” Antoine exclaimed, as if that had
been the gist of the conversation. “You see I have no one to keep house;
then I am out hunting, going up and down the river, working my farm. I
couldn’t be bothered with womankind. I can cook and keep house and wash
even. I like living alone. I could send her to New Orleans,” raising his
eyes furtively.

“You will do nothing of the kind,” said the other peremptorily. “Antoine
Freneau, you owe me this child. You know I was in love with the mother.”

“You were a mere boy,” retorted the old man disdainfully.

“I was man enough to love her then and always. I have never put any one
in her place. And the last time we walked together over yonder by the
pond, I told her I was going up north to make money for her, and that in
a year I should come back. I was twenty, she just sixteen. I can see her
now; I can hear her voice in the unformed melody of the child’s. We made
no especial promise, but we both knew. I meant to ask your consent when
I came back. Seven months afterward, on my return, I found you had
whisked her off and married her to the Count, who, after all, cared so
little for her that her child is nothing to him. I don’t know what lies
you told her, but I know she would never have given me up without some
persuasion near to force.”

The old man knew. It had been a lie. He kept out of Gaspard’s way for
the next two years, and it was well for him.

“There was no force,” he returned gruffly. “Do you not suppose a girl
can see? He was a fine fellow and loved her, and she was ready to go
with him. No one dragged her to church. Well, the priest would have had
something to say. They are not wild Indians at Quebec, and know how to
treat a woman.”

Gaspard had never forced more than this out of him. But he was sure some
trickery had won the day and duped them both.

“Well, what have you gained?” mockingly. “You might have kept your
daughter here and had grandchildren growing up about you, instead of
living like a lonely old hermit.”

“The life suits me well enough,” in a gruff tone.

“Then give me the child that should have been mine. You don’t want her.”

“What will you do with her?”

“Have a home some day and put her in it.”

“Bah! And you are off months at a time!”

“There would be some one to look after her. I shall not lead this roving
life forever. If she were less like her mother you might keep her, since
you were so won by her father. And I am not a poor man, Antoine
Freneau.”

“She is such a child.” Did Gaspard mean that some day he might want to
marry her?

“That is what I want. Oh, you don’t know——”

He paused abruptly. Antoine could never understand the longing that had
grown upon him through these weeks to possess the child, to play at
fatherhood.

“No, I shall not be likely to marry,” almost as if he had suspected what
was in Antoine’s pause, but he did not. “And I’ve envied the fathers of
children. They had something to work for, to hope for. And now I say I
want Renée because she is such a child. I wish she could stay like this
just five years; then I’d be willing to have her grow up. But I know
you, Antoine Freneau, and you won’t take half care of her; you couldn’t
love her, it isn’t in you. But you shall not crowd her out of love.”

“You talk like a fool, Gaspard Denys! But if you want the child—I am an
old man, and I tell you frankly that I don’t know what to do with her. I
would have to change my whole life.”

“And I would be glad to change mine for such a cause. You must promise
not to interfere in any way. We will have some writings drawn up and
signed before the priest.”

Antoine gave a yawn. “To-morrow, or any time you like. What are you
going to do now? It is late. If you will take a shakedown in the other
room—you see, I’m not prepared for visitors.”

“Yes; I have slept in worse places. The child has a box of clothes at
St. Charles. Hers will have to do for to-night.”

He straightened out the impromptu bed and fixed the child more
comfortably. He was tired and sleepy himself. Antoine lighted a bit of
wick drawn through a piece of tin floating in a bowl of oily grease and
took it in the storeroom, where both men soon arranged a sort of bunk.

“Good-night,” said Antoine, and shut the door.

But he did not go to bed. The fire had mostly burned out, and now the
torch dropped down and the room was full of shadows. He sat awhile on
the edge of the bed and made it creak; then he rose and opened the
shutter very softly, creeping out. Even then he listened suspiciously.
Turning, he ran swiftly down to the river’s edge, through the wet sedge
of last year’s grass. Then he gave a low whistle.

Some one answered with an oath. “We were just going away,” in a hissing
French voice. “What the devil kept you so?”

“I could not get away. There was a fellow,” and Antoine prefaced the
excuse with an oath. “He wouldn’t go; I had to fix a bunk for him.”

“Antoine Freneau, if you betray us—” in a threatening tone.

“Ah, bah! Would I kill the goose that lays golden eggs? Come, hurry.”

They unloaded some cases from the piroque and dumped them on the soft
ground.

“Now, carry them yourself. What! No barrow? You are a fool! But we must
be off up the river.”

There was considerable smuggling in spite of the watchfulness of the
authorities. Duties were levied on so many things, and some—many,
indeed—closely under government supervision.

Antoine Freneau tugged and swore. The cases of brandy were not light. He
went back and forth, every time peering in the window and listening; but
all was quiet. The cases he hid among the trees. He had drawn some tree
branches, ostensibly for firewood, and covered the cases with this brush
until he could dispose of them more securely.

Once, several years before, his house had been thoroughly ransacked in
his absence. He knew he was suspected of unlawful dealings, and he had a
dim misgiving that Gaspard had one end of the secret. He had more than
once been very overbearing.

He came in wet and tired, and, disrobing himself, crawled into bed. Fine
work, indeed, it would be to have a housekeeper and a prying child! He
laughed to think Gaspard fancied that he would be unwilling to give her
up.

Still he had hated Count de Longueville that he should have extorted so
much dowry. But then it seemed a great thing to have titled grandsons
and a daughter with the entrée of palaces, although he would never have
gone to witness her state and consequence.

Every year money had grown dearer and dearer to him, though, miser like,
he made no spread, never bragged, but pleaded poverty when he paid
church dues at Christmas and Easter.




CHAPTER II

OLD ST. LOUIS


Soon after daylight the strong west wind drove away the rain and clouds.
The air was soft and balmy, full of the indescribable odors of spring.
Birds began their pipings; robin and thrush and meadow-larks and
wood-pigeons went circling about on glistening wings.

Antoine found himself some dry clothes and kindled his fire. He would
bake a few corn cakes; they had demolished the loaf of bread last night.
There was a flitch of dried bacon and some eggs.

The door opened, and Gaspard wished his host good-morning. Renée was
still asleep.

There was a little rivulet that emptied in the mill pond, and near the
house Freneau had hollowed out quite a basin. Gaspard went down here for
his morning ablutions. A tall, well-developed man, just turned of thirty
with a strong, decisive face, clear blue eyes that could flash like
steel in a moment of indignation, yet in the main were rather humorous;
chestnut hair, closely cropped, and a beard trimmed in the same fashion.
He soused his head now in the miniature basin and shook it like a water
dog. Then he drew in long breaths of the divine morning air, and glanced
about with a sort of worship in his heart, took a few steps this way and
that. Antoine watched him with bated breath, he was so near the secret.

But Denys had heard nothing in the night. He was tired and had slept
soundly. Suddenly he bethought himself of the little girl and went into
the house. Antoine was preparing breakfast. Renée was sitting up,
glancing round. She had been in so many strange places this did not
disturb her.

She rose upright now, and stretched out her hands with a half-timid,
half-joyous smile.

“Uncle Gaspard,” she said, “where are we?”

Old Antoine raised his head. The French was so pure, the voice had an
old reminder of the one back of her mother.

“We are at St. Louis, child.”

“And where is the King?”

“Oh, my little girl, back in France. There is no king here. And we are
not French any longer, but Spanish.”

“I am French.” She said it proudly.

“We keep our hearts and our language French. Some day there may be
another overturn. I do not see as it matters much. The Spanish are
pretty good to us.”

“Good! And with these cursed river laws!” grumbled Antoine.

“If report says true, it can’t interfere very much with you.”

“Report is a liar,” the man flung out savagely.

Gaspard Denys laughed.

After a moment he said, “Isn’t there a towel or a cloth of some kind? I
dried myself in the air.”

“I told you I had not any accommodations for womenkind. You should have
left her at the convent. Farther back, it is De Longueville’s business
to care for her.”

“But you see he did not. You and he are her only blood kin, and you both
cast her off. It is well she has found a friend.”

“The convent and the Sisters would have been better.”

“Come, man, some sort of a towel,” exclaimed Denys imperatively.

Antoine rummaged in the old chest, and presently brought forth one.
Denys noted that it was soft and fine and not of home manufacture. Then
he led Renée out to the little basin and, dipping the towel in, washed
her face and hands.

“Oh, how good it feels!” she cried delightedly.

Gaspard had grown quite used to playing lady’s maid. He took a comb out
of its case of Indian work that he carried about in his pocket, and
combed out the tumbled hair. She winced now and then at a bad tangle,
and laughed on the top of it. Then he bent over and kissed her on the
forehead. She caught his head in her small arms and pressed her soft
cheek against his caressingly.

“I love you, Uncle Gaspard,” she exclaimed. “But I don’t love that old
man in there. Are you sure he is my grandfather? I couldn’t live here. I
should run away and live with the birds and the squirrels.”

“And the Indians.”

“But that Light of the Moon was sweet and pretty.”

“Yes. I should like to have brought her with us for your maid.”

“Oh, that would have been nice!” She clapped her hands. “What is over
there?” nodding her head.

“That is St. Louis—the fort, the palisades, the stockade to keep out the
Indians.”

“There are no Indians in France,” she said retrospectively.

“No. And I have wondered a little, Renée, if you would not rather be
back there.”

“And not have you?” She clung to his arm.

He gave a little sigh.

“Oh, are you not glad to have me? Does no one want me?”

The pathos of the young voice pierced his heart.

“Yes, I want you. I had no one to care for, no brothers or sisters or——”

“Men have wives and children.” There was a touch of almost regret in her
tone, as if she were sorry for him.

“And you are my child. We will go in town to-day and find some one to
look after you. And there will be children to play with.”

“Oh, I shall be so glad. Little girls?”

“Yes. I know ever so many.”

“I saw my little brothers in Paris as we came through. They were very
pretty—at least their clothes were. And papa’s wife—well, I think the
Queen couldn’t have had any finer gown. They were just going to the
palace, and papa kissed me farewell. It was very dreary at the old
château. And when the wind blew through the great trees it seemed like
people crying. Old Pierre used to count his beads.”

What a strange, dreary life the little girl had had! It should all be
better now. The child of the woman he had loved!

“If grandfather is rich, as Marie said, why does he live that way?”

She made a motion toward the house.

“No one knows whether he is rich or not. He trades a little with the
Indians and the boats going up and down the river.”

The shrill summons to breakfast reached them.

They went in, the child holding tightly to Gaspard’s hand. It seemed as
if her grandfather looked more forbidding now than he had last night. He
was both sulky and surly, but the viands were appetizing, and this
morning Renée felt hungry. Gaspard was glad to see her eat. The old man
still eyed her furtively.

“Well?” he interrogated, as they rose from the table, looking meaningly
at Gaspard.

“We are going in the town, the child and I,” Gaspard replied briefly.

Antoine nodded.

Oh, what a morning it was! The air seemed fairly drenched with the new
growth of everything; the tints were indescribable. Some shrubs and
flowers had begun to bloom. Renée had seen so much that was cold and
bleak, trees leafless and apparently lifeless amid the almost black
green of hemlocks and firs. Streams and pools frozen over, and a
coldness that seemed to penetrate one’s very soul. At Detroit it had
softened a little and all along the journey since then were heralds of
warmth and beauty. The child, too, expanded in it, and the changes in
her face interested Gaspard intently. He was a great lover of nature
himself.

Early St. Louis was all astir. From the bustle, the sound of voices, the
gesticulation, and running to and fro, it appeared as if there might be
thousands of people instead of six or seven hundred. Everything looked
merry, everybody was busy. There was a line of boats coming, others
already at the primitive landings, Indians and trappers in picturesque
attire, gay feathers and red sashes; fringes down the sides of their
long leggings and the top of their moccasins. Traders were there, too,
sturdy brown-faced Frenchmen, many of whom had taken a tour or two up in
the North Country themselves, and had the weather-beaten look that comes
of much living out of doors. Children ran about, black-eyed,
rosy-cheeked, shrill of voice. Small Indians, with their grave faces and
straight black hair, and here and there a squaw with her papoose
strapped to her back.

Gaspard Denys paused a moment to study them. He really had an artist’s
soul; these pictures always appealed to him.

They came in the old Rue Royale, skirting the river a short distance,
then turned up to the Rue d’Eglise. Here was a low stone house, rather
squat, the roof not having a high peak. A wide garden space, with fruit
trees and young vegetables, some just peeping up from brown beds and a
great space in front where grass might have grown if little feet had not
trodden it so persistently. A broad porch had a straw-thatched roof, and
here already a young girl sat spinning, while several children were
playing about.

“Lisa! Lisa!” called the girl, rising. “Ah, Monsieur Denys, we are very
glad to see you. You have been absent a long while. You missed the
merry-making and—and we missed you,” blushing.

A pretty girl, with dark eyes and hair done up in a great coil of
braids; soft peachy skin with a dainty bloom on the cheek and a dimple
in the broad chin. Her lips had the redness of a ripe red cherry that is
so clear you almost think it filled with wine.

“And I am glad to see you, Barbe,” taking her outstretched hand. “Ought
I to say ’ma’m’selle’ now?” glancing her all over, from the braids done
up to certain indications in the attire of womanhood.

She blushed and laughed. “Oh, I hope I have not grown as much as that. I
should like always to be Barbe to you.”

“But some day you may be married. Then you will be madame to everybody.”

“Lise thinks I have too good a home to give up lightly. I am very
happy.”

Madame Renaud came out of the house. She was taller and larger than her
sister, but with the same dark eyes and hair. Her sleeves were rolled up
above her elbows and showed a plump, pretty arm; her wide, homespun
apron nearly covered her.

“Oh, Gaspard—M’sieu Denys! You are such a stranger and we have missed
you much, much,” with an emphasis. “We were not sure but some Quebec
belle would capture you and keep you there. You will have warm welcomes.
Whose is the child?”

The other children had stopped their play and were edging nearer Renée,
who in turn shrank against Denys.

“I have come to talk about the child. May I not come in? Are you busy?”

“With bread and cakes. We are not so poorly off if we have a bad name,”
smiling with amusement. “Here is a chair, and a stool for the little
one. She looks pale. Is she not well?”

“She has had a long journey. First across the ocean, then from Quebec in
not the pleasantest of weather for such a tramp. But she has not been
ill a day.”

Denys placed his arm over the child’s shoulder, and she leaned her arms
on his knee.

Madame Renaud raised her eyebrows a trifle.

“You remember the daughter of Antoine Freneau?”

“Yes—a little. He took her to Canada and married her to some great
person and she died in France. Poor thing! I wonder if she was happy?”

She, too, knew of the gossip that Denys had been very much in love with
this girl, and she stole a little furtive glance; but the man’s face was
not so ready with confessions. Much hard experience had settled the
lines.

“Then the Count married again. He is in the King’s service at the
palace. They sent the child over to her grandfather. I went to Canada
for her.”

“And this is Renée Freneau’s child. Poor thing!”

She glanced intently at the little girl, who flushed and cast down her
eyes. Why was she always a poor thing?

“And that is no home for her.”

“I should think not! Home, indeed, in that old cabin, where men meet to
carouse, and strange stories are told,” said madame decisively.

“I am to be her guardian and look after her. I think I shall settle
down. I have tramped about enough to satisfy myself for one while. I
shall go into trading, and have some one keep a house for me and take
care of the child. Meanwhile I must persuade some one to give her
shelter and oversight.”

“Yes, yes, m’sieu,” encouragingly.

“And so I have come to you,” looking up, with a bright laugh.

Gaspard Denys very often obtained just what he wanted without much
argument. Perhaps it was not so much his way as his good judgment of
others.

“And so I have come to you,” he repeated. “If you will take her in a
little while, I think she will enjoy being with children. She has had a
lonely life thus far.”

“Poor thing! Poor little girl, to lose her mother so soon! And you think
old Antoine will make no trouble?”

“Oh, no, no! He would not know what to do with her.”

Madame Renaud laughed derisively, and gave a nod, throwing her head
back, which displayed her pretty throat.

“So I shall look after her. He will never interfere. It will not be for
long. And how shall I appear putting on fatherly airs?” in a tone of
amusement.

“Louis is but two and thirty, and you——”

“Have just turned thirty,” subjoined Gaspard.

“And little Louis is twelve, stout and sturdy and learning to figure as
well as read under the good père. Then there are three others, and papa
is as proud of them as was ever any hen with her chicks. I never heard
that Chanticleer was a pattern of fatherly devotion.”

They both laughed at that.

“And, Gaspard, you should have settled upon some nice girl at the balls.
You have been chosen king times enough.”

He flushed a trifle. “I have been quite a roamer in strange places, and
at first had a fancy for a life of adventure. But, as I said, I think of
settling down now. And if you will keep the little girl for me until I
get a home——”

“And you want a good housemaid. Gaspard, Mère Lunde has lost her son.
True, he was a great burden and care, and she has spent most of her
little fortune upon him. I think she would be glad——”

“The very person. Thank you a thousand times, Madame Renaud. I should
want some one settled in her ways, content to stay at home, and with a
tender heart. Yes, Mère Lunde will be the very one.

“She was going to the père’s; then his niece came from Michilimackinac.
They had bad work at the Mission with the Indians, and she just escaped
with her life and her little boy.”

“Yes; I will see her. It is advised that you get the cage before you
find the bird; but the bird may be captured elsewhere if you wait too
long. The child’s box comes in from St. Charles; they would not stir a
step farther last night. I must go and look after it. Then I can send it
here? And Louis will not kick it out of doors when he comes?” smiling
humorously.

“He will be liker to keep the little one for good and all and let you
whistle,” she retorted merrily.

“Thank you a hundred times until you are better paid. And now I must be
going. I expect the town will almost look strange.”

“And plain after gay Quebec; and Detroit, they say, has some grand
people in it. But, bah, they are English!” with a curl of the lip.

He rose now. Madame Renaud had not been idle, but had rolled out dough
fairly brown with spices and cut it in little cakes of various shapes,
filling up some baking sheets of tin.

“You will leave the child? Renée—what is her name? It has slipped my
mind.”

“Renée de Longueville.”

The child clung to his hand. “I want to go with you,” she said in a tone
of entreaty.

“Yes, and see St. Louis? He is her king or was until she touched this
Spanish soil.”

“The Spaniards have been very good to us. But we all hope to go back
again some day. Renée, will you not stay and play with the children?
There is Sophie, about your age or a little older, and Elise——”

“No,” she returned with a long breath; “I want Uncle Gaspard.”

“Adopted already? Well, you will bring her in to dinner?” with a cordial
intonation.

“If not, to supper.”

“You will tire her to death dragging her around.”

“Oh, heaven forefend,” in mock fear.

He paused a moment or two and glanced at Renée, half questioningly, but
she still clung to him.

They took their way along the street, but from every corner they had a
glimpse of the river, now flowing lazily along. The French seemed to
have a fancy for building their towns on the margin of a river. Partly,
perhaps, from fear of the Indians, but quite as much from innate
sociability, as they preferred compactness, and did not branch out into
farms until later on. But many of these squares had not more than three
or four houses; some, indeed, only one, the rest devoted to a garden.

Here was the market, but there were not many customers this morning,
though the stands were attractively arranged. And beyond was the old
Laclede mansion. He it was who had laid out the town and named its
streets. On the main street was his large store, but it was then the end
of Rue Royale. He had welcomed the emigration from Fort Chartres when
the English had taken possession, and set a band of workmen building log
houses for them. His own house was quite roomy and imposing.

Then they went down to the levee, which presented a busy and picturesque
sight. Boats were being unloaded of bales of furs and articles of
merchandise. Indians with blankets around them or with really gay
trappings; _coureur de bois_; Frenchmen, both jolly and stern,
chaffering, buying, sending piles of skins away on barrows, paying for
them in various kinds of wares, arms, ammunition, beads and trinkets,
though these were mostly taken by the squaws.

Denys found his parcels and the box belonging to the child, and
responded to the cordial greetings.

“Here, Noyan,” he called to a man who had just trundled his barrow down
and who paused to make an awkward salutation. He had a blue cotton
kerchief tied round his head, buckskin trousers, and a sort of blouse
coat made of coarse woollen stuff, belted in loosely; but it held a
pouch containing tobacco and his knife, and a small hatchet was
suspended from it.

“M’sieu Denys! One has not seen you for an age! Were you up to the
north? It is a good sight. And have you been making a fortune?”

The wide, smiling mouth showed white, even teeth.

“Not up in the fur regions. I took Canada this time.”

“Then thou hast lots of treasures that will set the dames and the maids
crazy with longing. They are gay people in those old towns, and the
state they keep is something like a court, I hear. Have you brought home
Madame Denys? Is it not high time?”

“Past time,” returning the laugh. “But our good Pierre Laclede is
content to remain a bachelor, and why not I?”

“I am afraid thou art hard to suit. Surely we have pretty maids here;
and at New Orleans it is said they make a man lose his head if they do
but smile on him. A dangerous place that!” and he laughed merrily.

“Are you busy?”

“Yes and no. I am to look after M. Maxent’s boat load, but it will not
be in until noon. So, if I can catch a job I am ready.”

“Then you are the man for me. Come. They have piled up the freight here
on the wharf. I am a lucky fellow to meet you. I feel quite strange
after my long absence. I suppose the old storehouse has not burned down?
It could not well be robbed,” and Monsieur Denys laughed with gay
indifference.

“When a man has only the coat on his back he need not be afraid of
thieves.”

“Unless he fall among Indians.”

“Ah, bah! yes,” with a comical shrug. “And sometimes they take his
skin.”

There were bales strapped up, with thongs of hide over the coarse
covering; some sacks made of hide; several boxes bound about with bands
of iron. Noyan looked them over and considered.

“I must go twice, M’sieu Denys,” looking askance as if his employer
might object.

“Very well. This box is to go to Madame Renaud’s.”

The man nodded, and began to pile on the goods, fastening them with some
stout straps.

“Do you go, too?”

“Oh, yes. Here, Jaques, sit on this box and guard these two bundles, and
earn a little more than your salt.”

A shock-headed boy, with a broad, stupid face, had been looking on
indifferently, and now he dropped on the box like a weight of lead, with
a grunt that meant assent and a grin that betokened satisfaction.

“We must retrace our steps,” said Denys to the little girl. “But it is
not far.”

They passed the market again. They turned into the Rue de Rive, just
beyond the Rue Royale. A building of rough stone, with a heavy doorway
that looked as if it had been deserted a long while, which was true
enough. A broad bar had fastened it securely, and the great lock might
have guarded the treasures of Niebelungs.

Denys unlocked it with some difficulty, threw open the door and
unfastened the shutter.

“Whew! What a musty old hole! It must be cleaned up. I will attend to
that to-morrow. Dump the things in here, and then go for the others.”

On the western end was an addition of hewn logs, with big posts set in
the corners. Denys marched around and surveyed it. There was a space of
neglected ground, with two or three fine trees and a huddle of
grape-vines fallen to the ground. It did not look altogether inviting.
But just beyond was the Rue de la Tour that led straight out to the old
fort, and only a step farther was the church and the priest’s house.
Then, it would not be very far from the Renauds.

Renée was watching him as he peered about.

“It looks a dull place for a little girl!” he exclaimed.

“Are you going to live here?” with some curiosity.

“Oh, yes. But it will be fixed up. And—a flower garden,” hesitatingly.

“I don’t mind if you are here,” and she slipped her hand in his with a
gesture of possession.

“And we will have a nice old woman to get our meals and make our beds
and keep the house tidy. Oh, it will be all right when it is cleared up.
And you will soon know some little girls. And we can take walks around.”

She started suddenly. A bird up in the tree poured forth a torrent of
melody. Her eyes grew luminous, her lips quivered, her pale cheeks
flushed.

“Oh, birds!” she cried. “I used to talk to them at the château and feed
them with crumbs. They would come to my hand.”

“You shall tame them here. Oh, we will have nice times together,” and
now he pressed her hand.

The sweetness of her little face went to his heart. Yes, she was like
her mother.

Noyan came with the next load, threw off the few parcels, and took his
way to Madame Renaud’s. Denys locked his door again and they turned
away.

“Now we will go and find Mère Lunde. It is up somewhere by the fort.
That will be quite a landmark for you. And the great Indian chief,
Pontiac, that I told you about at Detroit, lies buried there.”

“I do not think I like Indians,” she returned gravely. “Only the babies
are so odd, and the little children. It is a pity they should grow up so
cruel.”

“We have kept very good friends with them thus far.”

They had begun to build the new palisades. Yes, here was the fort, and
the Guion house, and the grave that she did not care to linger over.
Then they turned into the street of the Barns, _La rue des Granges_, and
soon found Mère Lunde, who was cooking a savory pottage, and welcomed
Gaspard Denys warmly.

A little old Frenchwoman such as artists love to paint. She was round in
the shoulders, made so by much stooping over her son and her work in the
tiny garden, where she raised much of her living. She was wrinkled, but
her eyes were bright, and her cheeks still had a color in them. She wore
the coif, her best one being white, but this a sort of faded plaid. Her
skirt just came to her ankles, and to-day she had on sabots, that made a
little clatter as she stepped round. Over her shoulders was pinned a
small gray kerchief. She looked so cheerful and tidy, so honest and
kindly, that she went to one’s heart at once.

M’sieu must hear about her son, poor lad—all she had to live for. Yet,
perhaps, it was well the Good Father took him before she went. And now
she worked a little for the neighbors. Everybody was kind to her. And
would they not partake of her simple meal? It was not much, to be sure,
but it would make her very happy.

Denys admitted that he was hungry, and Renée’s eyes had an assenting
light in them. Over the meal he made his proposal, which Mère Lunde
accepted with tears in her eyes.

“God is good,” she said, crossing herself devoutly. “Father Meurin said
I must have faith, and something would come. Oh, how can I thank you!
Yes, I will gladly keep your house, and care for the child, and strive
to please you every way. Oh, it is, indeed, the best of fortune to
happen to me, when life had begun to look lone and drear.”

“To-morrow, then, we will begin to clear up.”

“Yes; to-morrow,” she replied cheerfully.




CHAPTER III

A NEW HOME


In after years, when Renée de Longueville looked back at what seemed the
real beginning of her life, everything about the old town was enveloped
in a curious glamour. For it was all abloom. Such flowers, such great
trees in pink and white, such fragrance everywhere, and everybody moving
to and fro, as if impelled by some strange power. What were they all
doing? And the children were so merry. To a little girl who had been
mewed up in an old château, rather gloomy at that, and no one about but
elderly servants, the transition was mysterious, quite beyond the
child’s depth. But she felt the new life in every limb, in every nerve,
and she was full of joy.

The streets of the old town, if not wide, were comparatively straight;
those running along the river the longest, those stretching up to the
fort only a few squares. Nearly every homestead had its separate lot or
garden, enclosed by some sort of rude fence. Outside were the fields,
cultivated largely in common; woodlands and an immense prairie
stretching out to the northwest. Beside the fort were several towers in
which ammunition was stored, although the Spanish government had a great
fancy for building these.

Gaspard Denys was very busy cleaning up his place and making some
alterations. In his heart he began to feel quite like a family man. Most
of the stores were kept in the residences, except those down on the
levee. The people seldom suffered from depredations. Their treatment of
the Indians was uniformly honorable, and they kept them as much as
possible from the use of ardent spirits. The slaves were happy in their
lot. Indeed, a writer in early eighteen hundred speaks of the town as
arcadian in its simplicity and kindliness to its dependents. Women never
worked in the fields, and much of the housework was done by the slaves
and Indian women. Holidays were frequent, in which all joined. In the
summer, out-of-doors sports and dances often took place, very much like
modern picnics, at which one frequently saw parties of Indians. There
were no hostelries; but if a stranger came in town he was sheltered and
treated to the best. Hospitality was considered one of the first duties.

There was one large room in the log part of the house, but Denys
resolved to build another. His little girl should have a place of her
very own, and from time to time he would find adornments for it. Here
she should grow to womanhood. Antoine Freneau was not a young man when
he had married; and though people who did not meet with accidents lived
to a good old age, he was old already. He always pleaded poverty, though
he did considerable dickering in the way of trade, and it was surmised
that his business dealings would not stand honest scrutiny, and his
unsocial habits did not endear him to the joyous community. Still,
whatever he had left would come to Renée. He, Denys, would make sure of
that.

Renée soon became domesticated with the Renauds. Elise and Sophie played
about most of the time, and were jolly, laughing little girls. Twice a
week they went to the house of the good Father Lemoine, who taught them
to read and write and gave them some knowledge of mathematics, which was
quite necessary in trading. Twice a week the boys went, and on Saturday
they repeated the catechism orally.

Denys called in a little help; but every man was his own builder, with
some cordial neighborly assistance. So they raised the posts and
studding, and fastened the cross ties—round on the outside, the smooth
part, or middle, going on the inside. The interstices were filled with
mortar made of tough grass and clay that hardened easily. Sometimes this
was plastered on the inside, but oftener blankets were hung, which gave
a bright and cheerful appearance, and warmth in winter.

The stone part was cleared up and put in order. It had a big chimney,
part of which was in the adjoining room. Denys spread about quantities
of sweet grass to neutralize the musty smell; though the clear,
beautiful air, with its mingled perfumes, was doing that. On the shelves
he spread some of his wares, implements of different sorts were ranged
about the walls. Near the door was a counter; back of it two iron-bound
chests, very much battered, that he had bought with the place and the
small store of goods from the family of the dead owner. These held his
choicest treasures, many of which he had brought from Quebec, which were
to please the ladies.

The voyages up and down the river were often tedious, and sometimes the
traders were attacked by river pirates, who hid in caves along the banks
and drew their boats up out of sight when not needed. Peltries and lead
went down to New Orleans, wheat and corn and imported articles were
returned. There were some troublesome restrictions, and about as much
came overland from Detroit.

If Renée made friends with the Renaud household, they had no power to
win her from Uncle Gaspard. They had insisted on his accepting their
hospitality, though he devoted most of his time to the work he was
hurrying forward. Now and then he came just at dusk and spent the night,
but was always off early in the morning before Renée was up.

She often ran up the street, sometimes reaching the house before he
started. The children were ready enough to go with her, but she liked
best to be alone. She had a curious, exclusive feeling about him, young
as she was.

“But he is not your true uncle,” declared Elise, one day when she had
laid her claim rather strenuously. “Mamma said so. Your uncles have to
be real relations.”

“But he said when we were in Quebec that he _was_ my uncle—that I was to
be his little girl,” was the defiant rejoinder.

“And if your gran’père had not agreed?”

“I would never have stayed there. It makes me shiver now. I would—yes, I
would have run away.”

“He is not like our gran’père, who is a lovely old man, living up by the
Government House. And gran’mère gives us delightful little cakes when we
go there. And there are uncles and aunts, real ones. Barbe is our aunt.”

Renée’s small heart swelled with pride and a sense of desolation. She
had gathered already that Grandpapa Freneau was not at all respected;
and there were moments when she felt the solitariness of her life—the
impression that she had in some sense been cast off.

“But my father is at the palace of the King of France. He came to see me
on an elegant horse, and his clothes were splendid. And there are two
little brothers. Oh, such fine people as there are in Paris.”

That extinguished the little girls. It was true that now the French had
gotten over their soreness about the transfer. They never meddled with
politics, but they still loved the old flag. The Spanish governors had
been judicious men thus far.

So that night Renée slipped out from the supper table and sped like a
little sprite along the Rue Royale, and then up the Rue de Rive. The
moon was coming over the river with a pale light, as if she was not
quite ready for full burning. She heard the sounds of hammering, and
rushed in the open doorway.

“Well, little one! Your eyes are so bright that if you were an Indian
girl I should call you Evening Star.”

“I wanted to see you so,” in a breathless fashion.

“What has happened?”

“Why, nothing. Only the day seemed so long.”

“You went to the father’s?”

“Oh, yes,” rather indifferently.

“Why didn’t you run over then? You might have taken supper with me.”

“Because—there were Elise and Sophie.”

“But there was supper enough to go round. We had some fine broiled fish.
Mère Lunde is an excellent cook.”

“Oh, when can I come to stay?” Her tone was full of entreaty, and her
eyes soft with emotion.

“But—you won’t have any little girls to play with.”

“I don’t want any one but you.”

He had paused from his work, and now she sprang to him and encircled him
as far as she could with her small arms.

“You are not homesick?” It would be strange, indeed, since she had never
had a true home.

“I don’t know. That,” giving her head a turn, “is not my real home.”

“Oh, no. But they have all been good to you. Ma’m’selle Barbe is very
fond of you.”

“Oh, everybody is good and kind. Even Louis, though he teases. And Père
Renaud. But not one of them is you—_you_.”

“My little girl!” He stooped over and hugged her, kissed her fondly. The
child’s love was so innocent, so sincere, that it brought again the
hopes of youth.

“And you will always keep me—always?” There was a catch in her breath
like a sob.

“Why, yes. What has any one said to you?” with a slight touch of
indignation.

“Sophie said you were not my own uncle. What would make you so? Can you
never be?”

There was a pathos in her tone that touched him to the heart, even as he
smiled at her childish ignorance, and was wild to have the past undone.

“My dear, you can hardly understand. I must have been your mother’s
brother.”

“Oh, then you would have belonged to that hateful old man!” and she gave
her foot a quick stamp. “No, I should not want you to.”

He laughed softly. He would have been glad enough to belong to the
hateful old man years ago, and belong to the child as well.

“It doesn’t matter, little one,” he said tenderly. “I shall be your
uncle all my life long. Don’t bother your head about relationships.
Come, see your room. It will soon be dry, and then you shall take
possession.”

It had been whitewashed, and the puncheon floor—laid in most houses, it
being difficult to get flat boards—stained a pretty reddish color. The
window had a curtain hung to it, some of the Canadian stuff. One corner
had been partitioned off for a closet. There was a box with a curtain
tacked around it, and a white cover over it, to do duty as a
dressing-table. There were two rustic chairs, and some pretty Indian
basket-like pouches had been hung around.

“Oh, oh!” she cried in delight. “Why, it is as pretty as Ma’m’selle
Barbe’s—almost as pretty,” correcting herself. “And can I not come at
once?”

“There must be a bed for you to sleep on, though we might sling a
hammock.”

“And Mère Lunde?”

“Come through and see.”

In one corner of this, which was the ordinary living room, was a sort of
pallet, a long box with a cover, in which Mère Lunde kept her own
belongings, with a mattress on the top, spread over with a blanket,
answering for a seat as well. She had despoiled her little cottage, for
Gaspard Denys had said, “It is a home for all the rest of your life if
you can be content,” and she had called down the blessings of the good
God upon him. So, here were shelves with her dishes, some that her
mother had brought over to New Orleans as a bride; china and pewter, and
coarse earthenware acquired since, and queer Indian jars, and baskets
stiffened with a kind of clay that hardened in the heating.

“Welcome, little one,” she exclaimed cheerfully. “The good uncle gets
ready the little nest for thee. And soon we shall be a family indeed.”

She lighted a torch and stood it in the corner, and smiled upon Renée.

“Oh, I shall be so glad to come!” cried the child joyfully. “And my room
is so pretty.”

She looked with eager eyes from one to the other.

“And the garden is begun. There are vines planted by ma’m’selle’s
window. In a month one will not know the place. And it is near to the
church and the good father’s house.”

“But I wouldn’t mind if it was a desert, so long as you both were here,”
she replied enthusiastically.

“We must go back, little one. They will wonder about you. Just be
patient awhile.”

“And thou hast no cap,” said Mère Lunde.

“Oh, that does not matter; the night is warm. Adieu,” taking the hard
hand in her soft one. Then she danced away and caught Gaspard’s arm.

“Let us walk about a little,” she pleaded. “The moon is so beautiful.”
If they went direct to the Renauds’, he would sit on the gallery and
talk to Barbe.

“Which way?” pausing, looking up and down.

“Oh, toward the river. The moon makes it look like a silver road. And it
is never still except at night.”

That was true enough. Business ended at the old-fashioned supper time.
There was one little French tavern far up the Rue Royale, near the
Locust Street of to-day; but the conviviality of friends, which was
mostly social, took place at home, out on the wide porches, where cards
were played for amusement. The Indians had dispersed. A few people were
strolling about, and some flat boats were moored at the dock, almost
indistinguishable in the shade. The river wound about with a slow, soft
lapping, every little crest and wavelet throwing up a sparkling gem and
then sweeping it as quickly away.

From here one could see out to both ends. The semi-circular gates
terminated at the river’s edge, and at each a cannon was planted and
kept in readiness for use. Now and then there would be vague rumors
about the English on the opposite shore. The new stockade of logs and
clay surmounted by pickets was slowly replacing the worn-out one.

Renée was fain to linger, with her childish prattle and touching
gestures of devotion. How the child loved him already! That a faint tint
of jealousy had been kindled would have amused him if he had suspected
it.

When they turned back in the Rue Royale they met M. Renaud enjoying his
pipe.

“Ah, truant!” he exclaimed; “they were beginning to feel anxious about
you. Barbe declared you might stay all night. Was it not true you had
threatened?”

“They would not have me,” she returned laughingly, her heart in a glow
over the thought that when she did stay permanently, there would be no
need of Uncle Gaspard going to the Renauds’.

“Was that it?” rather gayly. “The girls will miss thee. They are very
fond of thee, Renée de Longueville.”

Then Renée’s heart relented with the quick compunction of childhood.

“M. Laclede’s fleet of keel boats will be up shortly, I heard to-day.
The town must give him a hearty welcome. What a man he is! What energy
and forethought! A little more than twenty years and we have grown to
this, where there was nothing but a wild. Denys, there is a man for
you!”

“Fort Chartres helped it along. I was but a boy when we came over. My
mother is buried there, and it almost broke my father’s heart to leave
her.”

“Those hated English!” said Renaud, almost under his breath. “The
colonies have revolted, it is said. I should be glad to see them driven
out of the country.”

“Yes, I heard the talk at Quebec and more of it as I came down the
lakes. But the country is so big, why cannot each take a piece in
content? Do you ever think we may be driven out to the wilderness?”

“And find the true road to India?” with a short laugh. “Strange stories
are told by some of the hunters of inaccessible mountains. And what is
beyond no one knows,” shrugging his shoulders.

No one knew whether the gold-fields of La Salle’s wild dreams lay in
that direction or not. There were vague speculations. Parties had
started and never returned. The hardy pioneers turned their steps
northward for furs. And many who heard these wild dreams in their youth,
half a century later crossed the well-nigh inaccessible mountains and
found the gold. And before the century was much older ships were on
their way to the East of dream and fable.

Barbe and Madame Renaud were out on the porch in the moonlight, and it
was very bright now. Denys would not stay, and soon said good-night to
them, going back to his work by a pine torch.

Renée counted the days, and every one seemed longer. But at last the
joyful news came.

“We shall run over often,” declared Sophie, who had a fondness for the
little girl in spite of childish tiffs.

Renée was busy enough placing her little store of articles about,
discovering new treasures, running to and fro, and visiting Mère Lunde,
who had a word of welcome every time she came near.

“It will be a different house, petite,” she said, with her kindly smile.

The garden could not compare with the Renauds in the glory of its gay
flower-beds. Two slaves of a neighbor—they were often borrowed for a
trifle—were working at it. A swing had been put up for the little lady.

But somehow, when the afternoon began to lengthen, when Uncle Gaspard
had gone up to the Government House on some business, and Mère Lunde was
in a sound doze over the stocking she was knitting, Renée felt strangely
solitary. She missed the gay chat of Madame Renaud and her sister and
the merriment of the children. There seemed none immediately about here.
She strolled around to the front of the store; the door was locked, and
it looked rather dreary.

She was glad to-morrow was the day for the classes to meet. Why, it was
almost as lonesome as at the old château!

That evening Uncle Gaspard brought out his flute, which filled her with
delight. The violin was the great musical instrument in St. Louis—the
favorite in all the French settlements. But the flute had such a tender
tone, such a mysterious softness, that it filled her with an
indescribable joy. And there was none of the dreadful tuning that rasped
her nerves and made her feel as if she must scream.

Then, it was strange to sleep alone in the room when she had been with
Ma’m’selle Barbe and the two girls. They were versed in Indian
traditions, and some they told over were not pleasant bed-time visions.
But the comfort was that all these terrible things had happened in
Michigan, or a place away off, called New England; and Sophie did not
care what the Indians did to the English who had driven them out of the
settlements on the Illinois. So, why should she? She was still more of a
French girl, because she was born in France.

But the world looked bright and cheery the next morning, and the
breakfast was delightful, sitting on the side toward Uncle Gaspard, and
having Mère Lunde opposite, with her gay coif and her red plaid kerchief
instead of the dull gray one. Her small, wrinkled face was a pleasant
one, though her eyes were faded, for her teeth were still white and
even, and her short upper lip frequently betrayed them. She poured the
coffee and passed the small cakes of bread, which were quite as good as
Madame Renaud’s.

The lines were not strictly drawn in those days between masters and
servants. And Mère Lunde had been her own mistress for so many years
that she possessed the quiet dignity of independence.

Then Renée inspected her room afresh, ran out of doors and gathered a
few flowers, as she had seen Ma’m’selle Barbe do. She ventured to peep
into Uncle Gaspard’s abode.

“Come in, come in!” he cried cheerily. “There is no one to buy you up,
like a bale of merchandise.”

“But—you wouldn’t sell me?” Her eyes had a laughing light in them, her
voice a make-believe entreaty, and altogether she looked enchanting.

“Well, it would take a great deal of something to buy you. It would have
to be more valuable than money. I don’t care so much for money myself.”

He put his arm about her and hugged her up close. He was sitting at a
massive old desk that he had bought with the place. It seemed crowded
full of various articles.

“But you love me better than any one else?”

“Any one else? Does that mean ever so many people love you? The Renaud
children, and Ma’m’selle Barbe, and—perhaps—your grandfather?”

“Oh, you know I don’t mean that!” Her cheek flushed with a dainty bit of
vexation. “The others _like_ me well enough, but you—how much do you
love me?”

“The best of any one. Child, I do not think you will ever understand how
dear you are to me. There is no measurement for such love.”

That was the confession she wanted. Her face was radiant with delight—a
child’s pleasure in the present satisfaction.

She glanced around. “Do you mean to sell all these things?” she asked
wonderingly.

“Oh, yes and many more. I ought to be down on the Rue Royale, where
people could find me easily. But I took a fancy to this old place, and
the man was in my debt; so he paid me with it. It would not be so
pleasant to live down there, on the lower side, by the levee. But I
shall stay here and wait till the people come to me. After all, for a
few years, if we get enough to eat and a little to wear, it will
suffice.”

“And what then?” with captivating eagerness.

“Why, then—” he hesitated. Why should he think of this just now? He did
not want her grown up into a charming mademoiselle, even if she
resembled her mother still more strongly.

“Yes; what then? Isn’t it just the same afterward, or do people come to
a time when they stop eating?” and a gleam of mischief crossed her face.

“That is at the end of life, child—sixty or eighty years.”

“No, I don’t mean that time,” with a shrug and a little curl of the lip.
“Maybe—after a few years——”

“Well?” in amused inquiry.

“You might go to New Orleans and take me. Ma’m’selle Barbe has been, and
she says it is so beautiful and gay.”

“And you have been half over the world. Ma’m’selle has not been to
Quebec nor Detroit.”

“Oh, that is true enough,” laughingly. “Nor to France.”

Two customers paused at the door, and he said, “Run away, dear.” So she
went obediently, watched Mère Lunde at her work awhile, then strolled
out to the garden spot, where two hired slaves were working. What should
make them so different from white people? Where was Africa and the
Guinea Coast that she heard spoken of at the Renauds’? Their lips were
so thick and red and their hair so woolly. But they seemed very merry,
though she could not understand a word they said; it was a queer patois.

Uncle Gaspard came out presently. “Wouldn’t you like to have a flower
garden?” he asked.

“What is here?” She put out her small moccasined toe toward a rather
stiff-looking plot of green plants.

“Oh, that is Mère Lunde’s garden of herbs. All manner of things for
potage, and the making of sundry remedies in which she has great faith.
She will look after that.”

“And must I look after mine?”

“I will come and help you.”

“Oh, then, I will have a garden!” she cried joyfully.




CHAPTER IV

THE SOWING OF A THORN


It was only a short distance to the priest’s house, where the classes
met. She ran off by herself. There was quite a throng of girls, though,
as with most of the early Western settlers, education was not esteemed
the one thing needful for girls. To make good wives was the greatest
attainment they could achieve. Still, Father Lemoine labored with
perseverance at the tillage of their brains on the two afternoons, and
the tillage of their souls on Saturday.

After the two hours were over the restless children had a run up to the
Fort. The Guions there were Madame Renaud’s relatives. There was a great
thicket of roses that covered the line of palings, and some ladies were
having refreshments under a sort of arbor, little cakes and glasses of
wine much diluted with water.

“Oh, yes, come in,” exclaimed Sophie as Renée hung back. “You have been
here before, you needn’t feel strange.”

That was true enough. Then she had been Sophie’s guest. Now she had a
curious hesitation.

Elise was going around courtesying to the ladies, and answering their
inquiries. Sophie stooped to play with the cat. An old lady nearest
Renée handed her a plate of small spiced cakes.

“You have gone to Monsieur Denys,” she said in a soft tone. “He is—”
raising her eyes in inquiry.

“He is my uncle.” Renée made a graceful little courtesy as she said
this, and thanked the lady for the cake.

“I suppose M. Denys means to settle down now,” said another. “It is high
time. He ought to marry. There is nothing like a good wife.”

“That will come along,” and another nodded with a mysterious but merry
smile. “That is why he is smartening up so. And he has brought some
elegant stuffs from Canada to dress her in when he gets her. Madame
Aubrey was in yesterday and bought of him a gown for Genevieve. He was
showing her some finery that would adorn a bride. I think we shall hear
before long.”

They all nodded and glanced sidewise from Elise to Sophie as if they
might have something to do with it.

“I must go,” exclaimed Renée, her face flushing.

“No, wait, I am not ready,” said Sophie.

But Renée courtesied to them all and flashed through the rose-hung
entrance. She ran swiftly down the street, turned the corner to her own
home, and entered the gate. Mère Lunde sat at the doorway knitting.

“Where is Uncle Gaspard?” she cried breathlessly.

“In the shop chaffering. They have found him out, you see, and I hope
the good Father of all will send him prosperity,” crossing herself
devoutly.

Renée dropped down on the doorstep. Her child’s heart was in a tumult.
Had not the house been planned for her, and the pretty room made
especially? Where would he put a wife? His small place in the corner of
the shop, hung about with curtains, was not fit, since the wife would be
Ma’m’selle Barbe, whose pretty white bed had fringed hangings that she
had learned to knot while she was in New Orleans.

“Why do you sigh so, little one?”

Renée could not contain her anxiety.

“O ma mère, do you think Uncle Gaspard will marry?” she cried with
passionate vehemence. “Will he bring a wife here to live with us?”

“What has put such a thing in thy head, child? Surely the good priest
would not venture to suggest that to thee!”

“It was in the Guions’ garden. I went there with the girls. And some one
said he had fixed the house for that, and they smiled and I knew who
they meant.”

She wiped some tears from her hot cheek.

“Who was it?” the dame asked simply.

“Who should it be but Ma’m’selle Barbe! Oh, I could guess who they
thought would come.”

“Ma’m’selle is a pretty girl and sweet tempered. She has a dot, too,”
said the placid woman. “But then I think——”

Renée burst into a passion of tears, and springing up stamped on the
ground.

“She shall not come here!” she cried vehemently. “She shall not have
Uncle Gaspard! Oh, why did he go clear to Canada for me, why did he
bring me here?”

“There was your gran’père——”

“But he doesn’t want me. No one wants me!”

“Chut! chut! little one. Do not get in such a passion. Surely a child
could not help it if it was to be so. But now that I think the matter
over, he said I must come, as there would be no one here to look after
you, and that your gran’père’s was no place for you. Truly, it is not,
if the whispers about him are well grounded. It is said the river
pirates gather there. And he goes away for weeks at a time. No, I do not
believe M. Denys means to marry.”

“Oh, truly? truly?” Renée flung her arms about the woman’s neck. “Say
again you do not believe it.”

Every pulse was throbbing, and her breath came in tangled gasps. The
woman’s tranquillity rasped her.

“Nay, he would have planned different. And Ma’m’selle Barbe has young
admirers. Ah, you should have seen her at Christmas and Epiphany! She
was chosen Queen, she had one of the lucky beans. She would hardly want
so grave a man. All young things love pleasure, and it is right; care
comes fast enough.”

And now Renée remembered that a young man had spent evenings with his
violin, and they two had sat out on the gallery. But she could not
divest her mind of the curious sort of suspicion that Barbe cared very
much for Uncle Gaspard.

“No, no,” went on Mère Lunde. “People gossip. They often mate two who
have no such intention. Dry thy eyes, petite, and laugh again. There has
a robin built in the beech near thy window, and now I think there are
young ones in the nest. I heard them cry for food. And the father bird
goes singing about as if he wanted to tell the news. It is pleasanter
than thine.”

Renée smiled then. Yes, if the young man loved, ma’m’selle. How they had
laughed and talked. Perhaps—and yet she was not quite satisfied.

But she went out and glanced up at the tree. Yes, there was a nest, and
a funny, peeping sound, a rustle in the branches.

The path had been packed clear down to the gate. Some garden beds were
laid out, and the neglected grass trimmed up. It began to look quite
pretty. If there was something to do, to keep away thoughts.

“Mère Lunde, will you teach me to knit?” she asked suddenly.

“And sew, child. A woman needs that.”

“I can sew a little. But I have nothing to sew.”

“That will be provided if you wish for it. I think your uncle will be
glad. I have heard that where there are holy Sisters they teach girls,
but we have none here. And now you may help me get the supper.”

That tended to divert her troubled thoughts. And then Uncle Gaspard came
in with a guest and the meal was a very merry one. Afterward the two sat
over the desk busy with writing and talking until she was sleepy and
went to bed.

She studied Uncle Gaspard furtively the next morning. He asked about the
school, and said in the afternoon they would take a walk, and this
morning she had better go to market with Mère Lunde.

She found that quite an entertainment. The old market was not much, a
little square with some stalls, all kept by old women, it seemed. One
had cakes, the _croquecignolles_, the great favorite with everybody. A
curious kind of dry candied fruit, and a sausage roll that the men and
boys from the levees bought and devoured with hearty relish. Then there
was a stall of meats and a portly butcher in a great white gown. Some of
the stands were there only two or three days in the week. Most of the
inhabitants looked out for their own stores, but there were the boatmen
and the fur traders, and the _voyageurs_. There was but one bake shop,
so the market stall was well patronized.

Some one called to Renée as she neared her own corner, and she turned.
It was a little girl she had seen in the class at the priest’s house.

“I am glad you have come here to live,” she began. “Your name is Renée
de Long——”

“Renée de Longueville,” with a touch of formality.

“And mine is Rosalie Pichou. I live just down in the street below. I
have five brothers and not one sister. How many have you?”

“None at all.”

“Oh, I shouldn’t like that. And I am always wishing for a sister. But
one of my brothers will be married shortly, only he is not coming home
to live.”

“Do you like him to marry?”

“Oh, yes, we shall have a gay time and a feast. And then there will be
the new house to visit. Andre is just twenty-one, Pierre is eighteen,
Jules sixteen, and I am twelve. I am larger and older than you.”

They had walked up to the gate. Mère Lunde stood by it. “Will you not
come in and see Renée?” she asked, on the child’s behalf.

“Oh, yes,” was the frank answer. “I came to see the new room when M.
Denys was building it. Oh, how pretty you have it!” in an almost envious
tone.

“But then you can have all. At home, there are two little boys to
provide for, and I think boys are always hungry. Jules gets lots of
game, he is such a good shot. Oh, I have such a pretty cat and a kitten.
I wonder if you would like the kitten?”

“Oh, yes,” said Mère Lunde. “A cat is a comfortable creature to have
about, and a kitten full of play, merci! One never tires of her pranks.
You will like it, Renée?”

The child’s eyes shone with delight.

“And your mother will let you bestow it?” the mère asked tentatively.

“Oh, yes. You see, there are two dogs and a tame squirrel, and Jules is
always bringing home something. Ma mère scolds about it. And Jules is
afraid the kitten may get at his birds. Oh, yes, you can have it without
doubt. I’ll run and fetch it now.”

Rosalie was back before she had time to go even one way, Renée thought.
A beautiful striped gray kitten, with a very cunning face. A fine black
stripe went from the outer corner of the eyes to his ears, and gave him
the appearance of wearing spectacles, which amused Renée very much. Then
they talked about the class.

“I hate to study,” declared Rosalie. “And reading is such slow work when
you don’t understand. But it is beginning to be the fashion, ma mère
says, and presently people will be despised if they do not know how to
read. I like the sums best. You can say them after the Father and not
bother your brains. And that’s why I don’t mind the catechism. It isn’t
like picking the words out of a page.”

“I can read quite well,” said Renée, with a little pride. “And I like
it.”

“I can make netting and knit stockings and am learning to cook. Oh, I
must go home at once and help ma mère with the dinner. She told me not
to stay, and that I was to ask you to visit me. Come soon,” and she made
a pretty gesture of farewell.

Renée picked up the kitten. It was very tame, and made believe bite her
hand. Then it gave a sudden spring.

“Oh, it will run away!” cried Renée in alarm.

But one of the men in the garden caught it and gave it back to her.

“Let us make him eat something. Then he will wash his face and stay. And
he will be excellent to catch mice in the shop. They destroy the skins
so.”

The kitten enjoyed a bit of meat. Then he sat down very gravely and
washed his face, which made Renée laugh.

Uncle Gaspard came home and expressed himself delighted with the kitten.
He was fond of cats, and had been thinking of one. They had their
dinner, and he said he knew the Pichous very well, and was glad Renée
had a playmate so near.

Presently they went out for their walk. Already Denys had explained to
Mère Lunde the prices of some of the ordinary articles, and where the
powder and shot were kept, so that she might provide for a casual
customer. But being a little out of the way, trade was not likely to be
very brisk.

They went up the Rue de la Place and out at the side of the fort. There
were no houses save here and there a few wigwams, and Indian children
playing about in the front of them. Cultivated fields stretched out. The
King’s Highway marked the western limit of the municipality; all the
rest was the King’s domain, to be granted to future settlers. There was
the wide prairie, and to the northward the great mound. They mounted
this, and then they could see up the winding of the river to the chain
of rocks, and the Missouri on its way to join the greater stream and be
merged in it. Farther still, vague woodlands, until all was lost in dim
outlines and seemed resting against the sky.

Gaspard Denys liked this far view. Sometimes he had thought of coming
out here and losing himself in the wilds, turning hunter like Blanchette
Chasseur, as a famous hunting friend of Pierre Laclede’s was called.
North of the Missouri he had built a log cabin for himself, where any
hunter or traveller was welcome to share his hospitality. Denys himself
had partaken of it.

Now he wondered a little if he had been wise to choose the child
instead, and give up his freedom. Blanchette had also established a post
at Les Pettites Côtes, which was the headquarters for many rovers, and
became the nucleus of another city. He was fond of adventures.

But if he, Denys, had married, as he had once dreamed! Then he would
have given up the wild life long ago. Then there would have been home
and love.

“O Uncle Gaspard,” Renée cried, “you squeeze my hand so tight. And you
walk so fast.”

He paused suddenly and gazed down in the flushed face, the eyes humid
under their curling lashes.

“My little dear!” and his heart smote him. “Let us sit down here in the
shade of this clump of trees and rest. You see, I never had a little
girl before, and forgot that she could not stride with my long legs.”

“And I am so thirsty.”

He glanced about. “We are only going a little farther,” he said, “and
then we shall find a splendid spring and something to eat. Are you very
tired?”

She drew a long breath and held up her little red hand.

“Poor hand!” he said tenderly, pressing it to his lips. “Poor little
hand!”

She leaned her head down on his shoulder.

“You wouldn’t like to have me go away?” she murmured plaintively.

“Go away?” in surprise. “What put such an idea in your head?”

“You wouldn’t send me?”

Strange these thoughts should find entrance in her mind when he had just
asked himself that curious question so akin to it.

“What do you mean, little one?”

“If—if you married—some one—who did not want me,” in so desolate a tone
that it gave him a pang.

“But I am not going to marry any one.”

“Are you very, very sure?” with an indrawn breath.

He took her face between his hands suddenly and turned it upward. It was
scarlet and tears beaded the long lashes.

“Come,” he said in soft persuasion, “what is behind all this? Who has
been talking to you? If it is Mère Lunde——”

“No—she said it was not true.”

“Surely that little Pichou girl is not a mischief maker! If so, she must
keep clear of us. I will not have you tormented.”

Then Renée began to cry softly and the truth came out with sobs.

He smiled, and yet he was deeply touched. The little thing was jealous.
Yet was it not true that he was all she had in the world to love, and
that no one had really loved her until he came into her life? How she
had trusted him back there in Quebec after the first few hours!

Now he gathered her up in his arms as if she been a baby, and kissed the
small hot face, tasting the salt tears.

“Little one,” he began in a tender, comforting tone, “set your heart at
rest. If the good God spares us, there will be many pleasant years
together, I hope. I am not going to marry any one, and Ma’m’selle Barbe
has a fine young admirer. She doesn’t want an old fellow like me. You
can’t understand now, but when you are older I will tell you the whole
story. I loved your mother and your grandfather took her away, married
her to some one else. That is why you are so dear to me.”

“Oh!” she cried, with a depth of feeling that surprised him. “Oh!” Then
she dropped down on her knees and put her arms about his neck, and he
could feel her heart beat against his breast. He was immeasurably
impressed. Could she understand what that meant?

When he raised her face it was sweet and grave as that of an older
person might have been. Then she said softly. “I shall love you my whole
life long. I shall never love any one so dearly.”

How did she who had never had any one to love understand affection so
well? Perhaps because it is natural to the sex to own something it can
adore, and yet the little Renaud girls liked him very much, but there
was no such absorption in their regard. Ah, he was her all. They had the
natural ties of childhood on which to lavish their love. Barbe—he had
never thought of marrying her, though he had seen her grow up to
womanhood, and very charming at that. She was for some younger mate, and
there were plenty of them. Pretty girls, nor scarcely any girls, went
begging in the new countries. They were tempting enough without much
_dot_.

And that her little heart should be torn by jealousy! He could have
smiled, only it seemed pitiful. He pressed her closer, sorry any
innuendoes should have been made before her.

“Come, dear,” he began tenderly, “we have not finished our walk. Or will
I have to carry you?”

She sprang up lightly, her face all abloom, though her long lashes still
glistened.

“Oh, no, no,” smilingly. “But you have carried me—over part of the long
portage when I was so tired, and that night when it was dark. Oh, how
big and strong you are. There was some one in a book in the old
château—I have nearly forgotten, who was strong and brave. Uncle
Gaspard, why haven’t you any books? The little ones at the Father’s are
so queer, with their short sentences, and the children blunder so. I
like best to know about some person. Oh, can’t we all tell that the dog
barks and the kitten mews, the cock crows, without reading it in a
primer! And—I would like to have a prayer book of my very own.”

“I think I have one somewhere about. But I will send to New Orleans for
some books the next time the boats go down. People have not had much
time for learning thus far.”

“And I had nothing to do in the old château but play and read. There was
no one to play with,” sadly. “How funny that little girl was who brought
me the kitten! Five brothers! Well, I have two at home, in Paris, I
mean, but I never saw them only once. Rosalie! Isn’t it a pretty name? I
wonder if you would like me to be called anything else?”

“No, dear. You are a queen, my little queen. I don’t want you changed in
any way. I only want you to be happy and content.”

She was so thoroughly rested now that although she gave little skips
occasionally and held his hand tightly, her heart seemed as light as the
birds flying overhead. And now they were coming to a small Indian
settlement, with a few wigwams, and long stretches of corn up high
enough to make a beautiful waving green sea as the wind moved it in
undulating billows. Women were cooking out of doors on little stone
fireplaces. Children played about; two small papooses hung up to a tree
branch were rocking to and fro. In the sun lay two braves asleep, too
lazy to hunt or fish. Yet it was a pretty picture.

The tepees were in a semi-circular form. Denys passed the first one. At
the second a woman sat beside the flap doing some beautiful bead and
feather work. She raised her eyes and then sprang up with a glad smile,
holding her work in a sort of apron.

“It is M’sieu Denys,” in broken French, that sounded soft for an Indian
voice. “He has come back. He has taken a long journey to the Far East.”
She glanced curiously at the stranger.

“And brought home a little girl,” smiling at the child. “She has come
from the land of the great Onontio, and I am to care for her. I am not
going to rove about any more, but trade with the residents and send
goods up and down the river. And I shall want many articles of you,
Mattawissa.”

She smiled and nodded. “I make not much for trade, but sometimes the
hunters buy for their sweethearts as they return. And will you trade
beads and silks? The threads we make are so troublesome to dye, and
sometimes the color is rough, not pretty,” with a shrug. “I have heard
it comes up from the great city down below.”

“New Orleans. Yes. But I brought it with me from Canada. They use it in
the convents, where they do fine work. And the Spanish often take it
home to show, and ornament their houses for the strangeness of it, and
moccasins and bands, and the pretty things for real service. No one
makes them quite as well as you.”

“Will not the child sit down?” She brought a bag stuffed with grass,
much like the more modern hassock. Renée thanked her, and seated
herself.

Mattawissa was proud of her French, and lame as it was, brought it out
on every occasion when talking to the white people. Denys had a
smattering of several Indian tongues, which most of the fur hunters and
traders soon acquired.

Some of the little children of the forest crept up cautiously. Men they
were used to seeing; white women rarely, as those at a distance seldom
went into the settlements in their early youth. They were not strange to
Renée, and she smiled a little, but they retained their natural gravity
and evinced no disposition to make friends.

Then Renée’s attention was directed to the articles Mattawissa brought
out. Beautiful strips of wampum, collars ornamented with bits of shells
hanging by threads that made a soft, rhythmic sound as they were handled
about, bits of deerskin that were like velvet, on which she had traced
out delicate fancies that were really fascinating. Denys grew
enthusiastic over them, and begged them all.

“This is for Talequah, the daughter of the Sioux who marries the son of
a chief before the moon of roses ends. I cannot part with that. But I
want beads, and if I could come in and choose?” inquiringly.

“Oh, yes, come in by all means,” Denys answered quickly. “I want to send
down the river—in a fortnight perhaps, and will take whatever you can
spare. You shall look over my store and select.”

“To-morrow if you like,” hesitatingly.

“Yes, the sooner the better.”

“I will bring these.”

“No, I will take them. It is not a heavy load,” with a pleasant smile.
“And surely I am as able as you to carry the parcel. Then I am not a
brave. A trapper is used to waiting on himself.”

“But—I have something for the child.”

“O Renée, you will like that. Ma’m’selle is getting her chamber
furnished.”

“And you must eat.” She went in the wigwam and returned with a red
earthen bowl decorated on the outside with a good deal of taste, not
unlike Egyptian pottery, the yellow edge so burned in and rubbed by some
process that it suggested dull gold burnished. Also a dainty boat made
of birch bark embroidered and beaded, with compartments inside for
trinkets, or it could be used for a work-box.

“Oh, how very pretty! Uncle Gaspard, I can keep the boat on my table,
and the bowl on the little shelf you put up. And I shall fill it with
flowers. Madame, I thank you with all my heart. I know it is because you
like Uncle Gaspard so well, for an hour ago you did not know of me;” and
she pressed the Indian woman’s hand.

“I am glad it pleases you. I may find some other article. And now be
seated again. There is a long walk before you, and you must have
something to eat.”

She went out to the old woman bending over her preparations, and brought
for each a bowl of sagamity, a common Indian repast, oftener cooked with
fish than bits of pork; and a plate of cakes made of Indian corn pounded
fine in a rude mortar, or sometimes ground with one stone on top of
another. For though there were mills that ground both corn and wheat,
the Indians kept to their primitive methods. What did it matter so long
as there were squaws to do the work?

Renée did not like the sagamity, but the cakes were good and the birch
beer was fine she thought. In spite of protest she insisted on carrying
her treasures home.

Then Mattawissa wove a few strands of grass together, and bringing the
four ends up over the bowl knotted them into a bunch and made a kind of
basket. A piece of bark was slipped under the joining and this wound
around with a bit of deerskin so that it would not cut the fingers.
Renée watched the process with much interest, and thought it very
ingenious.

Then they started homeward quite fresh from their long rest, but at the
last they had to hurry a little lest the gate at the fort should be
closed.




CHAPTER V

WITH A TOUCH OF SORROW


The boats were coming up the river, a long line slow moving, and not
with the usual shouts and songs. Half the town turned out to welcome
them. Along the edge of the levee in the old days stretched a
considerable bluff, washed and worn away long ago to the level of Market
and Chestnut Streets. From here you had much of the river both up and
down in clear sight.

It was thronged with men now in motley array, smoking their short pipes,
exchanging a bit of badinage and telling each other what treasures they
expected. For a few weeks there would be a rush of business until the
boats were loaded again and everything dropped back to the olden
inertia. There would be plenty of frolics too and a great warm welcome
for Pierre Laclede.

A canoe was coming up swiftly, and yet there was no sign of gladness on
the boats, no flags flying gayly.

“What does it all mean?” said some one perplexed.

The canoe was steered slowly, touched the rude wharf, and the cheer died
in the throats of the throng.

“It is bad news we bring. Monsieur Laclede is not with us. M. Pierre
Chouteau is heartbroken. Where is the colonel?” and the boat swung
round.

“Here, here,” and the tall, soldierly man sprang down the steps. “What
is it? What has happened to my brother?” and his tone was freighted with
anxiety.

“Nothing to him but sorrow, Monsieur le Colonel. But our brave and true
friend, our great man and leader in everything, M. Laclede, is lost to
us forever. Monsieur, he is dead.”

The sailor bowed reverently. Colonel Chouteau clasped his hands
together.

“Dead! dead! Our beloved M. Laclede.” It ran through the crowd like a
knell.

A great wave of sorrow swept over St. Louis. True, the boats came in and
there was bustle and business enough unloading. Some of them were to go
farther up, but they paused in a reverent fashion. The merriment of
welcome was hushed in reverent sadness. The little bell began to toll,
the steps so eager a moment ago were slow enough now. Every one felt he
had lost a friend.

“But when and how did this happen?” asked Colonel Chouteau, dazed by the
unexpected sorrow, and still incredulous.

The captain of one of the boats on which indeed Pierre Laclede had taken
his passage, stepped to the wharf and made a salute with his hand. Every
one crowded around to hear the story.

It was melancholy enough and moved more than one to tears. M. Laclede
had not been altogether well on leaving New Orleans, and was trusting to
the exhilarating air of his loved town to restore him. But fever set in
and he had grown rapidly worse. It was a long and tedious journey in
those days, and medical lore was at a low ebb. Before they had reached
the Arkansas River the brave soul had yielded up his life, still in the
prime of a splendid manhood, not even attaining the privilege of
sepulture in the town of his heart, for which he had worked and planned
with a wisdom that was to remain long years afterward, like the
fragrance of a high, unwearied soul.

They gathered in groups relating this and that to his praise. He had
founded the town, his busy brain and far-reaching wisdom had seen and
seized upon the points possible for a great _entrepôt_ of trade. And in
the years to come his wildest dreams would be more than realized, though
the faint-hearted ones feared now that everything would stop.

Renée was aroused to a great interest in the tales of the intrepid
explorers. Sitting in the door in the soft darkness, for now the moon
did not rise until past midnight, she lingered, listening with a child’s
eagerness to whom something new and wonderful is related, and Denys
telling adventures that even now moved him deeply. De Soto marching with
his little band across the Continent, suffering from perfidy and mutiny,
resolved to find a westward passage and the gold that had rewarded other
explorers in South America, and at last ill and wearied out, giving up
his life, and at night pushing off on the longer journey where friendly
hands rowed out silently as if to some unknown country, and softly
dropped their burden in the river, partly it is said because they did
not want the Indians to know that he was mortal and could die.

Marquette and Joliet, brave heroes of a faith they wished to establish
everywhere, La Salle with his indomitable courage, being deserted and
with but one guide pushing through dangers, then going to France to seek
aid from the great king, convinced now that the Mississippi River was
not a waterway to the western coast as some had predicted, but would
open up a great river route to the Gulf of Mexico. There were wild
guesses in those days. But this proved true. In the name of Louis XIV.
he took possession of this splendid estate, that rendered France the
greatest proprietor of the new country. Not content with all this glory
he must essay another dangerous trip and lose his life by a perfidious
follower.

Men made histories in those days and had but little time to write them.
Priests’ journals and letters were to translate them later on. But
stories and legends were told over, passed down in families, and
treasured as sacred belongings.

Renée was deeply interested. The heroism stirred her. Nearly every story
she wound in some way about Uncle Gaspard. It seemed as if he must have
sailed in every boat, trudged through wildernesses, even explored the
old cave with its shining walls and sides of lead that they mistook
first for silver; and after getting over his disappointment how Sieur
Renault opened the grand Valle mine that seems inexhaustible even
to-day. Gaspard had a wonderful way of making all these old heroes live
in the flesh again.

Renée was a very happy little girl now. It was quite true that
Ma’m’selle Barbe had a lover, a handsome young fellow who was devoted,
who came every night with his violin, and when he did not play sang
charming French love songs. The Guions would much rather have had it
Gaspard Denys. He was “settled.” And then he was a shrewd business
fellow and would be sure to make a fortune. Already he was acquiring a
good trade. Alphonse Maurice had no business of his very own, and was
barely twenty-one. But youthful marriages were very much in vogue in
those days, and most of them were happy. Life was so much more simple.

Madame Renaud had a great leaning toward Gaspard as well. But what could
one do if he would not come, would not play the lover? She would have
laughed at the idea of the little Renée in any sense being a rival.

The child had settled to a happy round. She went to the classes, but she
could read very well, and Gaspard had a way of explaining figures to
her. There was the business, too, that she was taking a great interest
in, and this amused him very much.

Her kitten grew and was a great pet. There was a flower garden, though
wild flowers grew all about and there were wild berries in profusion.
She often went with Mère Lunde to gather them, sometimes with parties of
children. She learned little housewifely tricks as well. When she found
Mère Lunde had no end of memories and legends tucked under her cap, she
often made the gentle old body bring them out, when Uncle Gaspard had to
spend his evenings talking to the men.

She rather liked the Saturday lesson, though she soon had it all by
heart. And she was quite a devout little church-goer. She had been very
much impressed when Father Gibault, the vicar general, came up and
delivered a funeral oration for Monsieur Pierre Laclede.

Meanwhile the Chouteau brothers stepped into M. Laclede’s business.
Colonel Auguste Chouteau had been his lieutenant and right-hand man for
years. He was very proud of the town, too, and resolved to improve the
old Laclede house and make it quite a centre.

There was a new governor as well. Why a mild and judicious ruler like
Francisco Cruzat should have been superseded by an avaricious,
feeble-minded Spaniard, who was half the time incapable from drink, no
one could explain.

Meanwhile some larger questions were coming to the fore that caused
great uneasiness. There was war between the American colonies and the
British, who had conquered a part of Canada. Spain avowed her sympathy
with the colonies. The Indians of the great northwest had affiliated
with the British. Then an American, Colonel Rogers Clark, had captured
the British posts at Cahokia and Kaskaskia, but afterward gone to
Vincennes.

Colonel Chouteau argued that the town should be put in a state of
defence. The new palisades had not been finished. This was pushed
forward now, the wall strengthened with logs and clay, and in some
places rebuilt. The old cannon was replaced with new, and the gates made
more secure. The governor even in his sober moments laughed at these
precautions.

Sometimes on a Sunday or holiday Gaspard Denys took Renée to visit her
grandfather. He made no effort to claim her. Indeed, he was away a good
deal, and then his cabin was locked up.

Over beyond at the southern end was the great Chouteau pond, almost a
lake where the mill was situated, then a kind of creek winding about and
another lovely spot, broadening out, turning around again, and ending in
a long point. Young people and older ones too went out to row, taking
their dinner in picnic fashion. They were always full of pleasure, these
merry French.

Christmas had delighted Renée, and brought a disappointment as well. It
was a great season in old St. Louis. At twelve o’clock every one who
possibly could went to midnight mass and the little church was crowded.
The people were already outgrowing it. Father Meurin had come up from
other visitations, there was good old white-haired Father Savigne, who
had been a missionary to the Indians and several times barely escaped
with his life. Father Valentine taught the children and was much
younger.

The altar was decorated and illuminated with candles in front of the
Virgin Mother and her baby Son. The solemn yet lovely sound of the
Gregorian chants made waves of music through the chapel and stirred
every heart. There was the solemn consecration, the kneeling, adoring
multitude, the heartfelt responses.

They might not have understood the intricate, hair-splitting truths of
to-day, and many no doubt came far short of the divine precepts, but
they did worship with all their hearts and souls. And when the priest
rang the bell on the hour of midnight it touched them all with deep
reverence; and they were glad to join in the hymn, and the benediction
descended like a blessing.

Ah, how beautiful it was out of doors! There was no moon, but myriad
stars gleamed and glowed, and it seemed as if they were touched with all
faint, delicate colors. The ground was white with snow, the peaked roofs
were spires, and the river a dark, winding valley.

Outside the church everybody shook hands and gave good wishes. Children
and old people were all together. No one would have missed the mass. But
now they chatted gayly and talked of the coming day, the young men
loitering to capture some pretty girl and walk home with her.

Mère Lunde stirred the fire and Denys put a great log on it, and on his
own in the shop. The little girl’s window was hung with a fur curtain,
for occasionally the wind found chinks to whistle through as it came
from the great prairies beyond and brought the sound of writhing and
sometimes crushed forests. But all was warmth within. Mère Lunde made a
hot drink with wine and spices, and brought out her Christmas cake which
she had not meant to cut until to-morrow.

“But see, it is to-morrow already,” she said with her cheery laugh. She
had devoted several prayers for her poor son’s soul and she was quite
sure he was safe with the Blessed Virgin and now understood what
heavenly life was like.

“It was all so beautiful,” Renée said with a long breath of delight.
“And the singing! I can hear it yet in the air.”

“Thou must to bed, little one, for to-morrow will be a gay day,” said
Gaspard, kissing her. “Mère, see that she is well tucked in, for the
night is cold.”

Alas! for all the precaution the little girl woke up with a strange hot
feeling in her throat, and her head was heavy and seemed twice as large
as ordinary. She tried to raise it, but everything in the room swam
round. She gave a faint cry, but no one heard, for Mère Lunde was busy
among pans and pots.

“Come, little laggard!” cried a cheery voice. “The children are here
with their étrennes.”

These were little cakes with dried fruit dipped in maple syrup and thus
coated over. The children carried them about to each other on Christmas
morning.

The only answer was a low moan. Uncle Gaspard leaned over the small bed.

“Renée, Renée, what is it?” He raised her in his arms and was startled
at her flushed face, her dulled eyes, her hot hands.

“O mère,” he cried. “Come, the little one is very ill.”

They looked at her, but she did not seem to know them, and moaned
pitifully. “Something must be done. She has taken cold, I think, and has
a hot fever.”

Very few people called in a doctor in those days. Indeed, it would have
been difficult to find him this morning. There were many excellent
home-made remedies that all housewives put up in the autumn, compounded
of roots and barks, some of them learned from the Indian women.

“Poor child, poor _petite_, yes, she must be attended to at once. Get
thy breakfast, m’sieu, while I make some comfort and aid for her. Yes,
it is a fever.”

“But what shall I do for her?”

“Get me some ears of corn, good big ones.”

“And leave her?” aghast at the thought.

“Thou wilt not cure her by staring at her. She can take no harm for a
few moments.”

There was always a big kettle standing on the coals with four short legs
holding it up. Mère Lunde raked out the ashes and pushed the flaming
brands under it. Gaspard exhumed an armful of corn from a big box in the
shop.

“Drop them in,” she said. “A dozen or so.”

“Oh, yes, I know now.” He nodded in a satisfied fashion, for he had
faith in the remedy.

Soon the water bubbled up and the fragrance of the steaming corn
diffused itself about the room. Mère Lunde went to the bed and put a
thick blanket under the child. Then the ears were laid about her and she
was rolled up like a mummy. The woman raised her head a trifle and
forced a potion down her throat that almost strangled her. Spreading
blankets over her, she tucked her in securely, and, patting the top one,
meant for love to the child, she turned away.

“Well people must eat for strength, and Christmas day is no time for
fasting. Come.”

But Gaspard Denys was in no mood for eating. He had never thought of
Renée being ill. He knew of some children who had died, and there was
Monsieur Laclede who looked strong enough to live to a hundred years,
who had gone out of life with a fever. Oh, he could not give up his
little girl!

“Is that all?” he asked presently.

Mère Lunde understood.

“There’s no use running in and out like the mill stream, for it’s the
flour that is getting ground,” she said sententiously. “Wait a bit.”

He had large patience with most events of life, but here was breathless
with suspense. If she had been drooping for days, but she was so merry
last night.

Rosalie came to the door. The children were going to Chouteau pond to
skate and slide. Would not Renée join them?

“Alas! Renée was very ill.”

“But she must get better by to-morrow,” nodding hopefully and laughing.

After that Grandpère Freneau came up, which startled Gaspard, for he had
never deigned to visit his grandchild. He was sober and comparatively
well dressed, and had a little gift for her, a curious inlaid box, with
a trinket a girl might like. She would be well again in a few days.
Children were tough and sturdy, it was the old people who had to think
about ills. As for him, he was strong enough yet.

Then he made a clumsy sort of bow and retreated.

“I hope it will bring no bad luck,” exclaimed Mère Lunde. “But he has
not a good name. I should throw the gift into the fire!”

“I dare say it is of no great value.” He shook the box. “Some bits of
silver with which he salves his conscience.”

Mère Lunde crossed herself.

He put it away in his desk. He was not superstitious, but he wished it
had not happened this morning.

It was quite late, but he unbarred his shop door. There was no trade
now. The fall business had lasted longer than usual on account of the
fine, open weather. When the cold once set in it often lasted steadily
for three months. But there was plenty of pleasure. The regular trappers
had gone off, but hunting parties often sallied out and returned laden
with game.

Mère Lunde stole in to look at her patient and shook her head, threw
some more ears of corn in the kettle and answered the calls that came in
a joyous mood and left in sorrow. For people were very sympathetic in
those days, and cares were shared in true neighborly fashion.

Presently there was a little moisture about the edge of Renée’s hair,
but the watcher did not like the dull purple of her cheeks nor the
labored breathing. There might be a poultice for the throat; yes, she
would make that. And if the good Father came and made a prayer! But that
seemed as if one must be very ill indeed.

Gaspard had no mind for pleasure. He went in and stood by the child, who
most of the time lay in a heavy sort of sleep. How strange she looked
with her red, swollen face, quite unlike herself!

Yes, he would go for Dr. Montcrevier, though he had not much faith in
him, for he seemed to think more of strange bugs and birds and fishes
than human beings. However, his search was fruitless, perhaps it was as
well.

“The fever is abating,” was Mère Lunde’s greeting in a joyous tone.
“Great drops have come out on her forehead. Ah, I think we shall conquer
with the good corn. And she has been awake.”

There was less pressure for breath, though the rattle in the throat was
not a pleasant sound. But by mid-afternoon she was in a drench of
perspiration, and then Mère Lunde rubbed her dry and rolled her in a
fresh blanket.

“What is the matter? I feel so queer,” exclaimed the tremulous voice.

“You are ill, poor little child,” in a tender tone.

“Is it morning? The night was so long. It seemed as if the house was
burning up.”

“It was the bad fever. Oh, yes, it is day, almost another night. Oh,
little one, the good God be praised!”

Mère Lunde dropped down on her knees and repeated a short prayer.

Renée raised her head.

“Oh, it still feels queer. And I am so tired.”

She dropped off to sleep again. Mère Lunde had two potions, one for the
fever, one for her general strength, but she would not disturb her now.
Sleep was generally a good medicine.

“She has spoken. She is better,” was the mère’s greeting as Denys
entered. “But she is asleep now. Do not disturb her.”

Yes, the dreadful purple was going out of her face. He took the limp
little hand. It was cooler, though the pulse still beat hard and high.
Ah, how much one could come to love and hardly know it until the threat
of losing appeared. And he thought of her mother. He could never get it
out of his mind but that she had died in cruel neglect, alone and
heartbroken. He pressed the slim fingers to his lips, he studied the
brow with its soft, light rings of hair, the almost transparent eyelids
and long lashes, the dainty nose that had a piquant ending not quite
_retroussé_ but suggestive of it, and the small mouth, the lips wide in
the middle that gave it a roundness often seen in childhood. She would
be a pretty young girl, though it was her soft yet deep and wondering
eyes that made her resemble her mother.

When she roused again Mère Lunde administered her potions. She made a
very wry face over the bitter one. The good mère put another poultice on
her throat and spread it well over her chest; rolling her up again like
a mummy. She would have laughed if there had not been a great lump in
her throat.

“I am like a papoose,” she said. “Uncle Gaspard, sit here and tell me
some stories.”

He would not go away after she had fallen asleep, but wrapped himself in
a blanket and leaned his head on the foot of her bed. Now and then she
moaned a little, which gave him a pang, and after midnight she grew very
restless. The fever was coming on again. Mère Lunde roused her and gave
her another potion, and before daylight she had prepared the corn bath
again. The fever did not seem to be as obstinate. By noon she was quite
comfortable. Father Lemoine brought in the vicar general, who was going
back to Ste. Genevieve. This was a great honor, and Mère Lunde brought
out some wine that had come from the real vineyards of France.

Father Meurin heard the little girl’s story. He had known of Antoine
Freneau, indeed, he had performed the first marriage and given the first
baptism in the little town. That was in a tent, because there was no
church. And the first services had been held in the fields, for the
church had been built hardly ten years.

“She would be in poor hands if left to her grandfather,” he admitted.
“And I hope she will be rightly brought up. If you had a wife, M.
Denys.”

“I have rambled about so much I have had no time to marry,” he returned
rather drily. “But now I shall settle down.”

“I hope so. It is what the towns need, steady occupancy. And you will
deal rightly with the child and see that she is brought up as a daughter
of the Church should be. You are quite sure her mother—” he finished the
question with his eyes.

“I saw the marriage register in the cathedral at Quebec. Then her mother
was taken to France, where she died,” Denys answered.

The vicar nodded, satisfied. He repeated the prayer for the recovery of
the sick and gave them all a kindly blessing with his adieu.

Gaspard Denys fell into a brown study. She was not his child, to be
sure. Would it make any difference any time in the future? Ought there
to be some woman different from Mère Lunde—bah! it would be years before
Renée was grown up. And the little one wanted no one to share his love.
He was glad—that would always be an excuse to himself. He never could
put any one in the place he had hoped to set Renée Freneau.




CHAPTER VI

BY THE FIRESIDE


Renée mended slowly. She had indeed been very ill. She was so weak that
it tired her to sit up among the pillows in her bed. And one day when
she insisted upon getting up she dropped over into Mère Lunde’s arms.

“Where is all my strength gone to?” she inquired pettishly.

“_Pauvre petite_,” it was queer, and the good woman had no science to
explain it.

But her throat improved and her voice cleared up, the fever grew lighter
every day and she began to have some appetite. Friends came in to
inquire and sympathize and bring delicacies. Madame Renaud offered her
services, but no one was really needed, though the cordial, smiling face
did Renée good. Ma’m’selle Barbe brought the two little girls, who
looked awestricken at the pale face, where the eyes seemed bigger than
ever.

Uncle Gaspard made a sort of settle on which they could put some
cushions and blankets so that she could be brought out to the living
room and watch Mère Lunde at her work. Then he improved upon it and made
it into a kind of chair with a back that could be raised and lowered by
an ingenious use of notches and wooden pins. He was getting so handy
that he made various useful articles, for in those days in these upper
settlements there were so few pieces of furniture that could be
purchased, unless some one died and left no relatives, which was very
seldom. Proud enough one was of owning an article or a bit of china or a
gown that was a family heirloom.

“Oh,” he said one evening when she was comfortably fixed and the blaze
of the great logs lighted up the room and made her pale face a little
rosy, “I had almost forgotten—you have been so ill it drove most other
things out of my mind. Your grandfather came up here on Christmas day
and brought you a gift.”

“A gift! Oh, what was it?”

“Mère Lunde had not forgotten, but she had a superstitious feeling about
it. I will get it for you,” Gaspard said.

He returned from the adjoining room with the box in his hand. It was
very securely fastened with a twisted bit of deerskin, which was often
used for cord.

“Open it,” she begged languidly.

He cut the cord but did not raise the cover. She held it some seconds in
her hand.

“Uncle, do you remember you told me about a girl who opened a box and
let troubles out all over the world?”

“But she was bidden not to. Grandpère Antoine did not leave any such
word as that,” smilingly.

She raised the cover slowly. There was a bit of soft white fur in the
bottom and on it lay a golden chain and a cross, with a pearl set where
the arms and upright met. In the clasp was a smaller pearl. She held it
up silently.

“The good saints must have touched his soul!” ejaculated Mère Lunde. “A
beautiful cross! It is gold?” with a questioning glance at Denys.

Renée handed it to him.

“Oh, yes, gold of course. And your grandfather seemed quite moved with
pity for you. I saw him again this morning, but he said, ‘Oh, I did not
think she would die.’”

Renée’s eyes were wide open, with a startled light. “Did anybody
think—that?” and her voice trembled.

“You may be sure I did not,” exclaimed Denys with spirit, almost with
joyousness. “I would not have let you go.”

She held out both arms to him, and he clasped her to his heart.

“But people are compelled to sometimes,” said Mère Lunde gravely.

“We were not compelled. And now you are to get well as rapidly as
possible. Everybody has been having a merry time with the king’s ball,
and you have missed it. But there is next year.”

How far away next year seemed! Spring, and summer, and autumn.

“How long have I been ill? It is queer, but I don’t seem to remember
clearly,” trying to think, and studying the leaping blaze that seemed
like a group of children playing tag, or hide and seek.

“It is almost a month. First it was pretty bad,” and he compressed his
lips with a queer expression and shook his head. Now he had let his hair
grow quite long, as most of the men did, and the ends fell into a sort
of curl.

“And then—Mère Lunde, the things you gave me were very bad and bitter,
and my head used to go round, I remember. Sometimes things stood on the
ceiling in such a funny position. And then to be like a baby, hardly
able to walk.”

She gave a soft, languid ripple of a laugh. Ah, what if he had lost her!

“And when can I go out?”

“Oh, not in a long while. It is bitter cold, even the river is full of
ice chunks. But you may dance at the next king’s ball.”

“The king’s ball?” inquiringly.

“Not the King of France,” with a gentle smile. “When the Christ was born
three kings came to do Him honor. And the feast is always kept.”

“The blessed Epiphany,” explained Mère Lunde. “Though why it should be
given over to all this merry-making I can’t see.”

“Did you ever go?” asked Renée.

“Oh, yes. But not last year—I had started for Canada. And the year
before I was up with the hunters.”

“Tell me about it.”

He sat down beside her. She was twisting the chain about her fingers.

“There is not much to do for the people who stay here in the winter,
though New Orleans is twice as gay. So they have the balls. There are
four queens, pretty young girls, and they each choose a king and open
the ball with him. Then they dance. But the old people and a good many
of the children go as well. And there is dancing and jollity and a feast
of good things to eat, and much laughing and jesting and falling in
love, with the marrying at Easter. Next year we will go.”

“I will keep my chain to wear then.” She put it back in the box. “And
when I am well I will go down and thank grandfather.”

“Yes, yes, that will be the right thing to do. I will take you.”

Then they were silent awhile. “Tell me some of the stories you know,”
she entreated.

“I have told you so many.”

“But you can think of one more,” in her coaxing tone. “Away up in the
north and the endless fields of snow, and where does it end?”

“At the North Pole, I believe.”

“And what is that?” eagerly.

“We will have to ask Dr. Montcrevier. I have never been farther than
Hudson’s Bay.”

“But people can’t live in such endless cold!”

“I think not. Only polar bears and the white and silver fox, and they
come down in the winter. And then there are islands hundreds of miles
away below us, where it is always summer.”

“What a queer world!” She smiled absently as if she could hardly take it
in. “Have you been there?”

“Only to New Orleans. Some day we will go there, too.”

“Oh, how much there is to do. Yes, one must live a long while to do it
all,” and a thoughtful expression deepened her eyes.

“And you are tired, little one. You must go to bed.”

It was strange to get so tired. She had been tired many times on the
long journey from Canada, but not like this. She was very glad she had
not died, however, though she had no very clear idea about death, except
that it meant going to another world. Uncle Gaspard was here, and that
was one reason why she wanted to stay.

Presently she began to go about and take pleasure in having the children
come in and tell her about their sports. The life was so simple, the
main thing seemed to be the good times. No one troubled about education
and there were no “higher branches” to vex one’s soul. There was much
less dissipation here than in New Orleans or even Detroit, where people
from other towns were continually mingling.

One day Uncle Gaspard took her out on his sledge. She had never dreamed
of anything so splendid. Great fields of snowy white, as far as the eye
could see, dotted here and there with a cluster of wigwam poles and
brown skins stretched on the outside for warmth. A little blue-gray
smoke curled lazily upward, and then the bluest sky over it all. The air
was exhilarating and brought a color to her pale cheeks, and made her
eyes glow like stars.

Then spring came. The white blanket melted away, the evergreens and
spruces scented the air with their new growth; the little streams rushed
hither and thither as if they were joyfully carolling, birds sang and
built everywhere. Children were out for wild flowers, and raced around
like deers. Some days the old mound was alive with them, then they were
down to Chouteau’s pond. The boys and often some girls went up the river
in canoes. There was the old rock of Fort St. Louis with its story of a
hundred years agone, of how La Salle had built a fort and planted an
Indian colony, that, when its leader had gone, dwindled and went back to
its native tribes. How there had been a fierce quarrel between the
Illinois and the Outgamies, and the Illinois had fled to the top of the
rock and stayed there until starvation stared them in the face and
French intervention came to their assistance.

Then business opened and Gaspard Denys found his hands full. His wide
acquaintance with the hunters and his dealings with the Indians brought
him in a great deal of trade. There was a continual loading and
unloading of boats, the levee was thronged. Denys had to take in a
clerk, and his evenings were devoted to straightening accounts and
preparing for the next day, and it seemed to Renée as if he was always
busy now, with no time for stories.

Easter brought a gay festival and several weddings. The young
_voyageurs_ were warmly welcomed home and there was always a feast or a
ball given in their honor. When the houses were too small, they went out
and danced on the green. Marriages seemed an especially social affair.
The families on both sides made the agreement and were mutually pleased.
It was seldom a young couple disregarded the respect universally paid to
parents, and though there was much pioneer life there was a kind of
elegance and refinement among the women with all their vivacious gayety.
The admixture of Spanish blood was no bad element.

One of the young traders had brought home with him a beautiful Indian
wife, lawfully wedded by one of the mission priests. These mixed
marriages were not in much favor with the French. Now and then a trapper
brought in one and stayed a few months, but she nearly always preferred
to share his hunting expeditions. Still, there were some comfortably
settled, whose families years afterward were very proud of their Indian
descent.

François Marchand found an old friend in Gaspard Denys. It does not take
a decade to cement a friendship made over camp-fires and days filled
with adventures and dangers. They had not met in two years, and the
youth, who seemed but a stripling to Gaspard then, was now a fine young
fellow, his slim figure filled out, his thin face rounded with certain
lines of energy, determination, and good health. His clear blue eyes
were resolute and undaunted; his chestnut hair was cropped close, which
made him less of an object for an Indian’s scalping knife.

“How the town has grown!” he exclaimed with great earnestness. New St.
Louis would have laughed at the idea that twenty or thirty families
could add much importance. But there had been a few new houses built,
sundry additions made to older ones where families had increased.
Colonel Chouteau was beautifying the house and grounds where his
lamented chief and dear friend had lived. The government house had been
repaired, though the new occupant seemed much more indifferent than his
people, and cared very little for the interest of the town in general.

“We shall have a fine place by and by,” returned Denys. “True, New
Orleans has the mouth of the great river, but if no boats come down,
what then? And we are the half-way house, the north and the south both
need us. If it were not for these troublesome restrictions on trade, and
the fear of the British.”

“France, it seems, has sided with the colonies, and Spain has given them
a certain sympathy,” returned Marchand. “You hear a good deal of talk up
north. The fur dealers of New Amsterdam are quite sure the colonies will
win in the end, though by my faith it doesn’t look very promising now,”
and he gave a doubtful laugh.

“Almost five years of losing and winning! Well, they are plucky not to
be discouraged. But what troubles me a little are the English over
there!” nodding to the eastward. “If some fine day they descend upon
us—well, we shall be wiped out, that is all about it! The government at
New Orleans does not seem to care, and sends us this drunken, insolent
fellow for commandant, who is as set in his own ways as a mule.”

“The English will be kept busy enough on the eastern coast defending
their ports and trying to capture the cities. Faith! it is a great and
glorious country, and I hardly know which has the best, the east or the
west. If some day the way is cleared to the Pacific coast, and then,
presto! India!”

India was still a dream of the advancement of commerce. The western
empire was to turn more than one brain.

Denys studied the young face in the glow of youthful enthusiasm.

“Marchand, you should have been a soldier,” he said.

“Well, which side shall I take?” mockingly. “I am French. Those cursed
English have driven us out of Canada. Thank Heaven we have left some
graves of heroes there. But I wonder what Louis le Grand could have been
thinking of to allow himself to be despoiled of such a magnificent
estate! And here we were all turned over to Spain without even a chance
to fight for our homes in the New World,” and Marchand gave a strong,
scornful laugh. “There are still the Indians left.”

“We have kept good friends with them so far.”

“But the British can stir them up easily. Rum and firearms may do the
mischief. Still, it is true that some day I may have to fight for my
life, or something I hold dearer than life.”

“Are you going back north?”

Marchand shook his head. He was sitting on a pile of skins leaning
against the wall, picturesque in his _voyageur’s_ attire, which was
highly ornamented with Indian work. Now and then in the intervals of
talk he blew out a volume of smoke from his pipe, or made rings in the
air when he took it from his mouth. There was something jaunty and
light-hearted about him in spite of the resolute eyes.

“Nay,” with a shake of the head, “I have cut myself out of that. I like
the life, too. Denys, were you ever very much in love? But no, that is a
foolish question, for you are the sort of man to fight for the one who
roused your soul. And so many pretty girls are here in St. Louis!”

“Yes, I heard you had married,” evading the half inquiry.

“I want you to see her, my beautiful Indian prize. Though I suspect
there is a strain of French blood back of her mother, who was brought
somewhere from Canada. And when her father was killed at one of those
dreadful massacres up on the strait (her mother had died before), she
and her brother were adopted in one branch of the Huron tribe. Her
brother married a chief’s daughter. I saw her first more than a year
ago, in the winter. She was only a child, not as forward as most Indian
maids. And last winter we met again, and yes, fell in love with each
other. The squaw who had been like a mother to her consented. But
straightway there was trouble. Her brother had chosen a brave for her, a
fellow noted for his fighting propensities and his love of drink. It was
surmised that he was buying her. She shrank from him with horror. He had
had two wives already, and rumor said he had beaten one to death. I was
ready to leave with my men and pack, and she came to me in terror and
despair. She would have killed herself, I know, before she could have
gone to such a brute. We loved each other, and the old woman Nasauka
pitied us, and had a strong liking for me. So it was arranged. I was to
start with my people, leaving her behind. When the train was several
days under way I was to remain at a given point where Nasauka was to
meet me with the girl, and then return to ward suspicion from the right
track. I only hope the poor woman did not suffer for her kindly sympathy
for us. We made our way along without any alarm. At a mission station a
priest married us. And now we are safe here and doubtless unsuspected.
But I shall not expose myself to any dangers, at least for several years
to come. There are other trails to work on. Or we may go farther south.”

“Quite a romantic story, Marchand. The saints be praised that you
rescued her from such a life, though I think she would have chosen death
rather. I have known of several instances. Yes, it will be safer not to
visit the old hunting ground, even if the brave solaces himself with a
new wife.”

“And now you must see her. I know there is a little prejudice, and,”
with a cynical sort of smile, “if I had a sister I should not let her
marry an Indian if I had to shut her up in a convent. But there are many
charming Indian girls and kindly hearted squaws, true as steel, who will
suffer anything rather than betray. Strange, too, when you find so much
deceit and falseness and cruelty among the men.”

“The women take all the virtues, perhaps. Yes, I shall be glad to
welcome you. To-morrow you will bring her to dine with us. Meanwhile,
you have found a home?”

“With the Garreaus. Pierre did the same thing, you know, and is happy
enough with his two pretty children. Ah, when you see my beautiful wife
you will not wonder that I went mad for her,” laughing with a kind of
gay triumph.

Ah, if he had been brave enough at twenty to fly with Renée Freneau! But
would she have dared an unblessed marriage? And then neither dreamed of
such a result from the journey to Canada.

“I shall not blame you,” Gaspard answered gravely. “And if you want a
staunch friend, here he is,” springing up and holding out his hand.

“A thousand thanks, Gaspard Denys. I wanted to tell you my story. It is
not for every one, only the fact that I have loved and married her. And
now it grows late. Good-night.”

They clasped hands again cordially. Denys shut his shop door and went
through to the other room. Mère Lunde was telling over some beads. Renée
sat in the chimney corner, but the fire was out long ago.

“Why did you let that man talk so long to you?” with pretty
imperiousness. “And I grew very sleepy. But I wanted to say good-night.”

“He had much to relate, a story you will like to hear sometime. And he
is coming to-morrow to bring a pretty Indian wife that he found up by
the Strait of Michilimackinac. That is a long name, is it not?”

“And is the strait long—as long as to the end of the millpond?”

“It is of more account. It connects the big Lake Michigan with Lake
Huron.”

Geography had not come to be one of the studies, and the only maps were
the traders’ rough outlines of journeys.

She was not considering the lakes. Her thoughts were as rapid as a
bird’s flight.

“Is she like Mattawissa?”

“Oh, younger, much younger. Only a girl. Fifteen or sixteen perhaps.
They will come to dinner to-morrow. Mère Lunde,” raising his voice a
little, “we shall have guests to-morrow. Give us a good dinner.”

“Guests! How many?” in a cheerful tone.

“Oh, only two. A young trader and his wife, a pretty Indian girl.
Unless, indeed, some one else drops in.”

This often happened in a town where there were no inns, and sometimes
led to rather amusing episodes when a traveller mistook the wide-open
doors and a bountiful table for a hostelry.

“Did you see her?” asked Renée, following out her own thoughts.

“No, but I have known him some time. He was a young lad here in the
town, François Marchand.”

Mère Lunde shut down the cover of the box that held her beads, and
picked up the end of her stout apron. It always seemed to assist her
memory.

“Marchand. And a boy. Had he very blue eyes?”

“Yes, and he has them still,” laughed Denys.

“Then I know. He was a nice lad. It is a thousand pities he has married
an Indian. Yes, you shall have a good dinner. Renée, it is time thou
went to bed.”

Renée rose and kissed Uncle Gaspard. She had, ever since her illness,
that seemed to have drawn them nearer together, if such a thing had been
possible.

As a great honor the next day, she brought out her pretty bowl and
filled it with flowers. Uncle Gaspard had made a small table with a
drawer that held Mère Lunde’s beads and some other choice articles, and
had a shelf low down on which was kept a work-basket with sewing
materials, for at times Renée was seized with a fit of devotion to her
needle. On the top of the table she set the bowl.

Curious eyes had followed François Marchand down the Rue de l’Eglise.
For with a vanity quite natural the young girl had taken in her flight
her beautifully ornamented dress that would have adorned any Indian
bride. Long afterward in the Marchand family they used to display
grandmère’s exquisitely worked suit.

Gaspard Denys with Renée by the hand went out to the gate to bid them
welcome. Renée almost stared. A slim, graceful figure of medium height,
with a face that in some towns would have attracted more attention than
the attire. Large, soft eyes of dusky, velvety blackness, a complexion
just tinted with Indian blood, the cheeks blossoming in the most
exquisite rose hue, while the lips were cherry red. Her long hair was
brushed up from her straight, low brow, held with a band of glittering
bead work, and falling about her shoulders like a veil, much softer and
finer than ordinary Indian hair. Her short skirt had a band of shining
white feathers overlapping each other, with here and there a cluster of
yellow ones that resembled a daisy. The fine, elegantly dressed fawnskin
was like velvet. The bodice was wrought with beads and variously colored
threads and a sort of lace the Indian women made, though it was an
infrequent employment, being rather tedious. Over her shoulders a cape
of soft-dressed, creamy skin, with designs worked here and there in fine
detail.

She colored daintily on being presented to M. Denys, and he in turn
brought forward his little protégé, who held up her head proudly and
felt almost as tall. But a second glance conquered Renée. She proffered
both hands cordially.

“Oh, I am sure I shall like you,” she cried frankly. How could any one
help adoring so much beauty! For Renée was not envious of beauty alone.

The young wife took the hands with glad pressure, and they went in
together.

“Here is a friend who remembers you,” said Denys to Marchand. “Her son
died, and at that juncture I wanted a housekeeper. She fits in
admirably.”

Mère Lunde trembled with delight when he shook her hand so heartily and
expressed his pleasure at seeing her again, declaring that she had grown
younger instead of older, which was true enough, so great a restorer is
freedom from care and fear of coming want.

“But the child?” said Marchand with curiosity in his eyes.

The child was playing hostess to the young wife with the ease and grace
of a true Frenchwoman, and displaying the adornments of her room. This
and that had come from Mattawissa, who made beautiful articles that
Uncle Gaspard sent to New Orleans, and who was sweet and friendly, not
like some of the morose old Indian women about. But then Mattawissa was
not old.

Gaspard smiled at the little girl’s chatter, and explained briefly.

“One would hardly think such a pretty innocent thing could belong to old
Antoine! Is he still in with the river pirates? His goods must be hidden
somewhere. He does not keep them in the house, it would seem, for the
guards found nothing when they searched.”

“He is a shrewd old dog,” replied Gaspard. “But his wife and his
daughter were of a different kind. And you see he could not have taken
charge of the child.”

Marchand nodded.

The dinner was certainly Mère Lunde’s best. The men had their talk about
trade and who was prospering, but the two girls, who sat side by side,
had some gay laughs, and occasionally hard work to understand each
other. Wawataysee, the Firefly, as she was called in her native
language, knew a little French and a little English, and often confused
them. Renée had picked up a few words of English, but the tongue was
quite despised at that time. And when the dinner was through they went
out to walk, pausing at the little old church and the priest’s house on
the way to the fort, and the little plot about.

Father Valentine came out and gave them a cordial greeting. Denys did
the honors.

The priest bent his head close to Marchand’s.

“You have been true and fair with this beautiful girl?” he asked a
little anxiously. “She is your lawful wife?”

“Yes, oh, a thousand times yes. Here is the good father’s signature and
that of the witnesses. It was at the little mission at St. Pierre’s.”

He took out a bundle of papers in a deerskin wallet. Tied securely in a
little package by itself was the priest’s certificate.

Father Valentine nodded, well pleased. “And she is a baptized
Christian,” he added. “I wish you both much happiness.”

“Suppose you keep this awhile for me,” said Marchand, “while I am
changing about. I hardly know yet where I shall settle.”

“Gladly will I oblige you. But why not stay here, my son? St. Louis
needs industry and energy and capable citizens for her upbuilding.”

“I am thinking of it, I confess. I have already met with a warm welcome
from old friends.”

They walked round about the fort. Wawataysee knew curious legends of
Pontiac and had heard of the siege of Detroit. Indeed, many of the
Hurons had participated in it. And here was the end of so much bravery
and energy, misdirected, and of no avail against the invincible march of
the white man.




CHAPTER VII

AT THE KING’S BALL


It was a very gay summer to Renée de Longueville.

Rosalie Pichou protested and grew angry at being superseded.

“She is only an Indian after all,” the girl exclaimed disdainfully. “And
my mother thinks it a shame M’sieu Marchand should have married her when
there were so many nice girls in St. Louis.”

“But she is beautiful and sweet. And, Rosalie, Uncle Gaspard will not
care to have you come if you say ugly things about her.”

“Well, I can stay away. There are plenty of girls to play with. And I
shall soon be a young ma’m’selle and have lovers of my own, then I shall
not care for a little chit like you. You can even send the cat back if
you like.”

The cat had grown big and beautiful and kept the place free from mice
and rats, which was a great object in the storeroom. Uncle Gaspard said
he would not trade it for a handsome silver foxskin, which everybody
knew was worth a great deal of money in France.

Madame Marchand made many friends by her grace and amiability. She
taught Renée some beautiful handiwork, and with the little girl was
always a welcome visitor at Mattawissa’s, though at first they had as
much difficulty understanding each other’s Indian language as if it had
been English. But what a lovely, joyous summer it was, with its walks
and water excursions up and down the river and on the great pond!

On Saturday she went with Renée to be instructed in the Catechism, and
whichever father was there he seemed impressed with Wawataysee’s sweet
seriousness and gentle ways.

Then autumn came on. The great fields of corn were cut, the grapes
gathered and the wine made. The traders came in again and boats plied up
and down. Uncle Gaspard was very busy, and the men about said, making
money. The women wondered if Renée de Longueville would get it all, and
what old Antoine Freneau had; if so she would be a great heiress.

There were nuts to gather as well, and merry parties haunted the woods
for them. Oh, what glorious days these were, quite enough to inspirit
any one! Then without much warning a great fleecy wrap of snow fell over
everything, but the sledging and the shouting had as much merriment in
it.

Gaspard Denys did not want Renée to go to midnight mass at
Christmastide.

“Oh, I am so much bigger and stronger now,” she said. “I am not going to
be such a baby as to take cold. Oh, you will see.”

She carried her point, of course. He could seldom refuse her anything.
And the next morning she was bright enough to go to church again. And
how sweet it was to see the children stop on the porch and with bowed
heads exclaim, “Your blessing, ma mère, your blessing, mon père,” and
shake hands with even the poorest, giving them good wishes.

Then all parties went home to a family breakfast. Even the servants were
called in. Then the children ran about with the étrennes to each other.

“Uncle Gaspard,” Renée said, “I want to take something to my
grandfather. He brought me that beautiful chain and cross last year, and
I made a cake that Mère Lunde baked, and candied some pears, thinking of
him.”

“Perhaps he is not home. You can never tell.”

“He was yesterday. M. Marchand saw him. Will you go?”

“You had better have Mère Lunde. I am busy. But if I can find time I
will walk down and meet you. And—Renée, do not go in.”

“I will heed,” she answered smilingly.

The road was hardly broken outside the stockade. Once or twice she
slipped and fell into the snow, but it was soft and did not hurt her.
Mère Lunde grumbled a little.

“There is a smoke coming from the chimney,” Renée cried joyfully. “Let
us go around to the kitchen door.”

They knocked two or three times. They could hear a stir within, and
presently the door was opened a mere crack.

“Grandfather,” the child began, “I have come to wish you a good
Christmas. I am sorry you were not at church to hear how the little babe
Jesus was born for our sakes, and how glad all the stars were, even, so
glad that they sang together. And I have brought you some small gifts, a
cake I made for you, alone, yesterday. You made me such a beautiful gift
last year when I was ill.”

“And you’ve come for another! That’s always the way,” he returned
gruffly.

“No, grandfather, I do not want anything, only to give you this basket
with good wishes and tell you that I am well and happy,” she said in a
proud, sweet voice, and set the basket down on the stone at the doorway.
“It would not be quite right for you to give me anything this year.”

Her gray fur cloak covered her, and her white fur cap over her fair
curls gave her a peculiar daintiness.

“Good-by,” she continued, ”with many good wishes.”

He looked after her in a kind of dazed manner. And she did not want
anything! True, she had enough. Gaspard Denys took good care of her—_he_
was too old to be bothered with a child.

But she skipped along very happily. The Marchands were coming in to
supper, and in the meanwhile she and Mère Lunde would concoct dainty
messes. She would not go out sledding with the children lest she should
take cold again.

It was all festival time now. It seemed as if people had nothing to do
but to be gay and merry. Fiddling and singing everywhere, and some of
the voices would have been bidden up to a high price in more modern
times.

And on New Year’s day the streets were full of young men who went from
door to door singing a queer song, she thought, when she came to know it
well afterward. Part of it was, “We do not ask for much, only the eldest
daughter of the house. We will give her the finest of the wine and feast
her and keep her feet warm,” which seemed to prefigure the dance a few
days hence. Sometimes the eldest daughter would come out with a
contribution, and these were all stored away to be kept for the Epiphany
ball.

In the evening they sang love songs at the door or window of the young
lady to whom they were partial, and if the fancy was returned or
welcomed the fair one generally made some sign. And then they said
good-night to the master and mistress of the household and wished them a
year’s good luck.

If a pretty girl or even a plain one was out on New Year’s day
unattended, a young fellow caught her, kissed her, and wished her a
happy marriage and a prosperous year. Sometimes, it was whispered, there
had a hint been given beforehand and the right young fellow found the
desired girl.

But the king’s ball was the great thing. In the early afternoon the
dames and demoiselles met and the gifts were arranged for the evening.
Of the fruit and flour a big cake was baked in which were put four large
beans. When all was arranged the girls and the mothers donned their best
finery, some of it half a century old, and kept only for state
occasions. The older people opened the ball with the _minuet de la
cour_, which was quite grand and formal.

Then the real gayety began. With it all there was a certain charming
respect, a kind of fine breeding the French never lost. Old gentlemen
danced with the young girls, and the young men with matrons. Children
were allowed in also, and had corners to themselves. It was said of them
that the French were born dancing.

There were no classes in this festivity. Even some of the upper kind of
slaves came, and the young Indians ventured in.

Gaspard Denys took the little girl, who was all eagerness. M. and Madame
Garreau brought their guests, the Marchands, for society had quite taken
in the beautiful young Indian, who held her head up so proudly no one
would have dared to offer her a slight.

Among the gayest was Barbe Guion. She had not taken young Maurice, who
had gone off to New Orleans. People were beginning to say that she was a
bit of a coquette. Madame Renaud announced that Alphonse Maurice was too
trifling and not steady enough for a good husband. In her heart Barbe
knew that she had never really meant to marry him.

At midnight the cake was cut and every young girl had a piece. This was
the great amusement, and everybody thronged about.

“A bean! a bean!” cried Manon Dupont, holding it high above her head so
all could see.

Then another, one of the pretty Aubry girls, whose sister had been
married at Easter.

“And I, too,” announced Barbe Guion, laughing.

They cleared a space for the four queens to stand out on the floor. What
eager glances the young men cast.

Manon Dupont chose her lover, as every one supposed she would, but there
was no fun or surprise in it, though a general assent.

“And how will she feel at the next ball when _he_ has to choose a
queen?” said some one. “She is a jealous little thing.”

Ma’m’selle Aubry glanced around with a coquettish air and selected the
handsomest young fellow in the room.

Who would Barbe Guion choose? She looked dainty enough in a white
woollen gown with scarlet cloth bands; and two or three masculine hearts
beat with a thump, as the eyes fairly besought.

Gaspard Denys was talking with the burly commandant of the fort, though
it must be admitted there was very little to command. She went over to
him and handed him her rose.

He bowed and a slight flush overspread his face, while her eyes could
not conceal her delight.

“You do me a great deal of honor, ma’m’selle, but you might have
bestowed your favor on a younger and more suitable man. I thank you for
the compliment,” and he pinned the rose on his coat.

She smiled with a softened light in her eyes.

“It is the first time I have had a chance to choose a king,” she said in
a caressing sort of voice. “I could not have suited myself better. And—I
am almost eighteen. Elise was married a year before that.”

“You are not single for lack of admirers, ma’m’selle.” She remembered he
used to call her Barbe. “What did you do with Alphonse, send him away
with a broken heart?”

“His was not the kind of heart to break, monsieur. And a girl cannot
deliberately choose bad luck. There is sorrow enough when it comes
unforeseen.”

Then they took their places. Renée had been very eager at first and
watched the two closely. M. Marchand had appealed to her on some trifle,
and now she saw Barbe and Uncle Gaspard take their places in the dance.

“Did she—choose Uncle Gaspard?” the child exclaimed with a long
respiration that was like a sigh, while a flush overspread her face.

“He is the finest man in the room! I would have chosen him myself if I
had been a maid. And if you had been sixteen wouldn’t you have taken
him, little girl? Well, your day will come,” in a gay tone.

Wawataysee placed her arm over the child’s shoulder. “Let us go around
here, we can see them better. What an odd way to do! And very pretty,
too!”

Renée’s first feeling was that she would not look. Then with a quick
inconsequence she wanted to see every step, every motion, every glance.
Her king! Barbe Guion had chosen him, and the child’s eyes flashed.

It was a beautiful dance, and the gliding, skimming steps of light feet
answered the measure of the music exquisitely. Other circles formed. The
kings and the queens were not to have it all to themselves.

The balls were often kept up till almost morning, though the children
and some of the older people went home. Gaspard made his way through the
crowd. Madame Marchand beckoned him, and as he neared them he saw Renée
was clinging to her with a desperate emotion next to tears.

“Is it not time little ones were in bed?” she asked with her fascinating
smile and in pretty, broken French. “Madame Garreau wishes to retire. It
is beautiful, and every one is so cordial. I have danced with delight,”
and her pleasure shone in her eyes. “But we will take the child safe to
Mère Lunde if it is your will.”

“Oh, thank you. Yes. You will go, Renée? You look tired.” She was pale
and her eyes were heavy.

“And you—you stay here and are Ma’m’selle Barbe’s king,” she said in a
tone of plaintive reproach that went to his heart.

“That is only for to-night. There are other queens beside her.”

“But she is _your_ queen.” The delicate emphasis amused him, it betrayed
the rankling jealousy.

“And you are my queen as well, to-morrow, next week, all the time. So do
not grudge her an hour or two. See, I am going to give you her rose,
_my_ rose, to take home with you.”

She smiled, albeit languidly, and held out her small hand, grasping it
with triumph.

He broke the stem as he drew it out, leaving the pin in his coat.

“Now let me see you wrapped up snug and tight. Mind you don’t get any
cold. Tell Mère Lunde to warm the bed and give you something hot to
drink.”

She nodded and the party went to the dressing room. The two Indian women
chattered in their own language, or rather in a patois that they had
adopted. Wawataysee was very happy, and her soft eyes shone with
satisfaction. Her husband thought her the prettiest woman in all St.
Louis.

Renée gave her orders and Mère Lunde attended to them cheerfully.

“For if you should fall ill again our hearts would be heavy with sorrow
and anxiety.” she said.

Renée had carried the rose under her cloak and it was only a little
wilted. She put it in some water herself, and brought the stand near the
fireplace, for sometimes it would freeze on the outer edges of the room,
though they kept a big log fire all night.

Gaspard went back to Ma’m’selle Barbe.

“Oh, your rose!” she cried. “Where is it?”

He put his hand to his coat as if he had not known it. “The pin is
left,” he said. “What a crowd there is! St. Louis is getting overrun
with people,” laughing gayly. “Give me a rose out of your nosegay, for
it would signify bad luck to go on the floor without it.”

He took one and fastened it in his coat again, and they were soon
merrily dancing. There was no absolute need of changing partners, and
the queens were proud of keeping their admirers all the evening.

Barbe was delighted and happy, for Gaspard evinced no disposition to
stray off, and danced to her heart’s content, if not his. He had grown
finer looking, certainly, since he had relinquished the hardships of a
trapper’s life. His complexion had lost the weather-beaten look, his
frame had filled out, and strangely enough, he was a much more ready
talker. Renée chattered so much, asked him so many questions, and made
him talk over people and places he had seen that it had given him a
readiness to talk to women. Men could always find enough to say to each
other, or enjoy silence over their pipes.

She seemed to grow brighter instead of showing fatigue, and her voice
had musical cadences in it very sweet to hear. The touch of her hand on
his arm or his shoulder in the dance did give him a peculiar sort of
thrill. She was a very sweet, pretty girl. He was glad not to have her
wasted on Alphonse Maurice.

But the delicious night came to an end for her. There was a curious
little strife among some of the young men to make a bold dash and
capture a queen. The girls were sometimes willing enough to be caught.
Barbe had skilfully evaded this, he noted.

“Ma’m’selle Guion has the bravest king of them all,” said a neighbor.
“He is a fine fellow. I wonder, Mère Renaud, you do not fan the flame
into a blaze. He is prospering, too. Colonel Chouteau speaks highly of
him and holds out a helping hand. If I had daughters no one would suit
me better.”

Madame Renaud smiled and nodded as if she had a secret confidence.

Mothers in old St. Louis were very fond and proud of their daughters and
were watchful of good opportunities for them. And those who had none
rather envied them. It was the cordial family affection that made life
in these wilderness places delightful.

Barbe was being wound up in her veil so that her pretty complexion
should suffer no ill at this coldest hour of the twenty-four, after
being heated in the dance. She looked very charming, very tempting. If
he had been a lover he would have kissed her.

“You come so seldom now,” she said in a tone of seductive complaint.
“And we were always such friends when you returned from your journeys.
The children have missed you so much. And Lisa wonders—”

“I suppose it is being busy every day. At that time you know there was a
holiday between.”

“But there is no business now until spring opens,” in a pleading tone.

“Except for the householder, the shopkeeper. Oh, you have no idea how
ingenious I have become. And the men drop in to talk over plans and
berate the Governor because things are not in better shape. We would
fare badly in an attack.”

“Are we in any danger from the British?”

“One can never tell. Perhaps they may take up Pontiac’s wild dream of
driving us over the mountains into the sea. No,” with a short laugh, “I
am not much afraid. And our Indians are friendly also.”

“Come, Barbe,” counselled Madame Renaud, but she took her husband’s arm
and marched on ahead like an astute general.

Barbe clung closely to her attendant, for in some places it was
slippery.

“Next time you will transfer your attentions,” she said with a touch of
regret. “I wonder who will be your queen for a night?”

“The prettiest girl,” he said gayly.

“Madame Marchand is beautiful.”

“But she is no longer a girl.”

“Oh, no. You see a good deal of her, though?”

“They are over often. We are excellent friends.”

“Renée is quite bewitched with her.”

“Yes, they are very fond of each other.”

And somehow she, Barbe, was no more fond of the child than the child was
of her.

Madame Renaud studied her sister’s face as they were unwinding their
wraps. It was rather pale, not flushed and triumphant as she hoped.

Gaspared Denys stirred the fire in his shop and threw himself on a pile
of skins and was asleep in five minutes. It had been a long while since
he had danced all night.

They all slept late. There was no need of stirring early in the morning.
They made no idol of industry, as the energetic settlers on the eastern
coast did. Pleasure and happiness were enough for them. It ran in the
French blood.

When Gaspard woke he heard a sound of an eager chattering voice. He
rubbed his limbs and stretched himself, looked down on his red sash and
then saw a withered red rose that he tossed in the fire.

“Ah, little one, you are as blithe as a bee,” was his greeting.

“Oh, Uncle Gaspard, you have on your ball clothes. When did you come
home?” she asked.

“I dropped asleep in them. I am old and stiff this morning. I tumbled
down on a pile of skins and stayed there.”

“You don’t look very old. And—are you a king now?” rather curiously.

“I must be two weeks hence. Then I resign my sceptre, and become an
ordinary person.”

“And Mère Lunde said you had to choose a new queen.” There was a touch
of elation in her voice.

“That is so. And I told Ma’m’selle Guion I should look out for the very
prettiest girl. I shall be thinking all the time.”

“I wish you could take Wawataysee. She is the prettiest of anybody, and
the sweetest.”

“And she has already chosen her king for life.”

“The breakfast will get cold,” warned Mère Lunde.

There were more snows, days when you could hardly stir out and paths had
to be shovelled. The next ball night it stormed, but Renée did not care
to go, because M. and Madame Marchand were staying all night and they
would play games and have parched corn and cakes and spiced drinks.
Wawataysee would sing, too. And though the songs were odd, she had an
exquisite voice, and she could imitate almost any bird, as well as the
wind flying and shrieking through the trees, and then softening with
sounds of spring.

Sometimes they danced together, and it was a sight to behold, the very
impersonation of grace; soft, languid mazes at first and then warming
into flying sprites of the forest. And how Renée’s eyes shone and her
cheeks blossomed, while the little moccasined feet made no more sound
than a mouse creeping about.

There was no especial carnival at St. Louis, perhaps a little more
gayety than usual, and the dances winding up at midnight. Nearly every
one went to church the next morning, listened to the prayers reverently,
had a small bit of ashes dropped on his or her head, went home and
fasted the rest of the day. But Lent was not very strictly kept, and the
maids were preparing for Easter weddings.

“It is strange,” said grandaunt Guion, “that Barbe has no lover. She is
too giddy, too much of a coquette. She will be left behind. And she is
too pretty to turn into an old maid. Guion girls were not apt to hang on
hand.”




CHAPTER VIII

THE SURPRISE


There was, it is true, a side not so simple and wholesome, and this had
been gathering slowly since the advent of the governor. More drunken men
were seen about the levee. There was talk of regular orgies taking place
at the government house, and the more thoughtful men, like the
Chouteaus, the Guerins, the Guions, and the Lestourniers, had to work
hard to get the fortifications in any shape, and the improvements made
were mostly done by private citizens.

Of course there were many rumors, but old St. Louis rested securely on
her past record. What the people about her were losing or gaining did
not seem to trouble her. Now and then a river pirate was caught, or
there was some one tripped up and punished who had traded unlawfully.

This had been the case with a French Canadian named Ducharme, who had
been caught violating the treaty law, trading with Indians in Spanish
territory, and giving them liberal supplies of rum in order to make
better bargains with furs. His goods were seized and confiscated, but he
was allowed to go his way, breathing threats of retaliation.

France had recognized the independence of the colonies, which had
stirred up resentment in the minds of many of the English in northern
Michigan. It was said an English officer at Michilimackinac had formed a
plan of seizing or destroying some of the western towns and stations
where there was likely to be found booty enough to reward them. Ducharme
joined the scheme eagerly and gathered roving bands of Ojibways.
Winnebagoes and Sioux, and by keeping well to the eastern side of the
Mississippi marched down nearly opposite Gabaret Island, and crossed
over to attack the town.

Corpus Christi was a great festival day of the church. Falling late in
May, on the 25th, it was an out-of-doors entertainment. After mass had
been said in the morning, women and children, youths and maidens, and
husbands who could be spared from business, went out for a whole day’s
pleasure with baskets and bags of provisions.

The day was magnificent. The fragrance of spruce and fir, the breath of
the newly grown grasses, the bloom of trees and flowers, was like the
most exhilarating perfume, and stirred all the senses.

Spies had crept down the woods to reconnoitre and assure themselves
their arrival had not been suspected. It seemed indeed an opportune
moment. It was now mid-afternoon. There had been dancing and merriment,
the children had run and played, gathered wild strawberries and flowers,
and some of the more careful ones had collected their little children
and started homeward.

To the westward was Cardinal Spring, owned by a man of that name, but
considered free property. He and another hunter had been shooting game,
and as he stooped for a drink his companion espied an Indian cautiously
creeping through the trees.

“Indians! Indians!” he shouted, and fired.

Cardinal snatched up his gun, but a storm of bullets felled him. Rivière
was captured. A young Frenchman, catching sight of the body of Indians,
gave the alarm.

“Run for your lives! Fly to the fort!” he shouted.

There were men working in the fields, and nearly every one took his gun,
as much for the chance at game as any real fear of Indians. They covered
the retreat a little, and as this was a reconnoitring party, the main
body was at some distance.

“Fly! Fly!” Men who had no weapons caught little ones in their arms and
ran toward the fort. All was wild alarm.

“What is it?” cried Colonel Chouteau, who had been busy with some papers
of importance.

“The Indians! The Indians!” shouted his brother.

“Call out the militia! Where is the Governor?”

“In his own house, drunk as usual,” cried Pierre indignantly, and he ran
to summon the soldiers.

There had been a small body of troops under the command of Captain
Cartabona, a Spaniard sent from Ste. Genevieve at the urgent request of
the chief citizens, but it being a holiday they were away, some canoeing
down the river or fishing, and of the few to be found most of them were
panic stricken. The captain had been having a carouse with the Governor.

“Then we must be our own leaders. To arms! to arms! every citizen! It is
for your wives and children!” was the inspiriting cry.

“You shall be our leader!” was shouted in one voice almost before the
Colonel had ceased. For Colonel Chouteau was not only admired for his
friendliness and good comradeship, but trusted to the last degree.

Every man rushed for his gun and ran to the rescue, hardly knowing what
had happened save that the long-feared attack had come upon them
unawares. They poured out of the fort, but the flying women and children
were in the advance with the Indians back of them.

Colonel Chouteau marshalled his little force in a circuitous movement,
and opened a volley that took the Indians by surprise. They fell back
brandishing their arms and shouting to their companions to come on. Then
the Colonel saw that it was no mere casual attack, but a premeditated
onslaught. Already bodies were lying on the ground struggling in death
agonies.

The aim was so good that the assailants halted, then fell back to wait
for their companions. This gave most of the flying and terrified throng
an opportunity to reach the fort. For the wounded nothing could be done
at present.

Now the streets were alive with men who had no time to pick out their
own families, but ran, musket or rifle in hand, to man the fort. Colonel
Chouteau and his brother Pierre were experienced artillerists, and
stationed themselves at the cannon.

The Indians held a brief colloquy with the advancing body. Then it was
seen that an attack was determined upon. They approached the fort,
headed by several white leaders, and opened an irregular fire on the
place.

“Let them approach nearer,” commanded the Colonel. The walls of the
stockade and the roofs of the nearest houses were manned with the
residents of the town. A shower of arrows fell among them. Surprised at
no retaliation, the enemy ventured boldly, headed by Ducharme.

Then the cannons poured out their volley, which swept down the foremost.
From the roofs muskets and guns and even pistols made a continuing
chorus. Ducharme fell. Two of the white leaders were wounded also. Then
another discharge from the cannons and the red foes fell back. The plan
had been to wait until almost dusk for the attack, but the incident at
the spring had hastened it.

Ducharme had not counted on the strength of the fort, and he knew the
town was but poorly supplied with soldiers, so he had persuaded the
Indians it would fall an easy prey and give them abundant pillage. But
the roar and the execution of the cannon dismayed them, and many of them
fled at once. Others marched slowly, helping some of the wounded.

General Cartabona came out quite sobered by the fierceness of the
attack.

“Would it not be well to order a pursuit?” he questioned.

“And perhaps fall into a trap!” returned Colonel Chouteau with a touch
of scorn. “No, no; let us bring in the wounded as we can.”

Gaspard Denys had been among the first to rush to the defence of the
town. Marchand had gone out with the party, and Mère Lunde was to care
for Renée. He had not stopped to look or inquire. He saw Madame Renaud.

“Oh, thank heaven my children are safe! But Barbe! I cannot find Barbe!”
she cried.

“And Renée?” his voice was husky.

“She was with the Marchands. They were going to the woods. Oh, M’sieu
Denys, what a horrible thing! And we felt so safe. The Indians have been
so friendly. But can you trust them?”

He was off to look after the wounded. A number were lying dead on the
field. No, Renée was not among them. They carried the wounded in gently,
the dead reverently. The good priest proffered his services, and Dr.
Montcrevier left his beloved experiments to come and minister to them.
The dead were taken to the church and the priest’s house.

All was confusion, however. Darkness fell before families were reunited.
Children hid away in corners crying, and were too terrified to come out
even at the summons of friendly voices. Colonel Chouteau and his brother
were comforting, aiding, exhorting, and manning the fort anew. General
Cartabona set guards at the gates and towers, for no one knew what might
happen before morning.

Denys had hurried home as soon as he could be released. “Renée!” he
called. “Mère Lunde!” but no one replied. He searched every nook and
corner. He asked the Pichous. No one had seen them. A great pang rent
his heart. And yet—they might have hidden in the forest. Ah, God send
that they might not be taken prisoners! But Marchand was with them. He
knew the man’s courage well. He would fight to the death for them.

“I must go out and search,” he said in a desperate tone. “Who will
accompany me?”

A dozen volunteered. They were well armed, and carried a rude lantern
made of tin with a glass in one side only. They saw now that their fire
had done good execution among their red foes. The trampled ground showed
which way the party had gone, and they were no longer in sight.

“Let us try the woods. They came by the way of the spring,” said one of
the party.

They found the body of Cardinal and that of an old man, both dead. They
plunged into the woods, and, though aware of the danger, Denys shouted
now and then, but no human voice replied. Here, there, examining some
thicket, peering behind a clump of trees, startling the denizen of the
woods, or a shrill-voiced nighthawk, and then all was silence again.

They left the woods and crossed the strip of prairie. Here lay something
in the grass—a body. Denys turned it over.

“My God!” he exclaimed in a voice of anguish. “It is François Marchand.”

He dropped on the ground overwhelmed. If he was dead, then the others
were prisoners. There was no use to search farther to-night. To-morrow a
scouting party might go out.

They made a litter of the men’s arms and carried Marchand back to the
fort, to find that he was not dead, though he had a broken leg and had
received a tremendous blow on the head.

A sad morning dawned over St. Louis, where yesterday all had been joy.
True, it might have been much worse. In all about a dozen had been
killed, but the wounded and those who had fallen and been crushed in the
flight counted up many more. And some were missing. What would be their
fate? And oh, what would happen to Wawataysee if some roving Indian
should recognize her! As for Renée, if he had not wholly understood
before, he knew now how the child had twined herself about his heart,
how she had become a part of his life.

Marchand’s blow was a dangerous one. The Garreaus insisted upon nursing
and caring for him, but Madame Garreau was wild about the beautiful
Wawataysee. She knew the Indian character too well to think they would
show her any mercy, if she was recognized by any of the tribe. And
Renée, what would be her fate?

General Cartabona was most anxious to make amends for past negligence.
The militia was called to a strict account and recruited as rapidly as
possible, and the fortifications made more secure. He took counsel with
Colonel Chouteau, who had the best interests of the town at heart.

“We must make an appeal for the Governor’s removal,” insisted the
Colonel. “It is not only this cowardly episode, but he is narrow-minded
and avaricious, incompetent in every respect, and drunk most of the
time. He cares nothing for the welfare of the town, he takes no interest
in its advancement. After such men as Piernas and Cruzat he is most
despicable. Any Frenchman born would serve Spain better.”

“That is true. I will head a petition of ejectment, and make it strong
enough to be heeded.”

The dead were buried, the living cared for. Even the fallen enemies had
been given decent sepulture outside the town. And Gaspard Denys felt
that he must start on his journey of rescue, if indeed that was
possible.

He chose two trusty young fellows, after shutting his house securely,
providing his party with ammunition, and provisions for a part of their
journey, as much as they could carry. He found the Indians had boats in
waiting on the Illinois River, and after proceeding some distance they
had separated in two parties, going in different directions. Some of the
prisoners had been left here, as they did not care to be bothered with
them.

The one party kept on up the river. They learned there were some women
with them, and were mostly Indians. It was not an easy trail to follow.
There had been a quarrel and another separation, a drunken debauch, part
stopping at an Indian village. And here Denys heard what caused him
almost a heart-break.

They had fallen in with some Hurons who had bought two of the captives.
An old woman was set free with two men and sent down the river. The
others were going up north.

“It is as I feared, Jaques,” he said. “They will carry Madame Marchand
to her old home as a great prize. Ah, if François were only well! But I
shall go on for life or death. I will not ask you to share my perils.
Wawataysee came from somewhere up by the straits. She ran away with
Marchand. She was to be married to an old Indian against her will. And
no doubt he will be wild with gratification at getting her back, and
will treat her cruelly. The child is mine and I must save her from a
like fate. But you and Pierre may return. I will not hold you bound by
any promises.”

“I am in for the adventure,” and Pierre laughed, showing his white
teeth. “I am not a coward nor a man to eat one’s words. I am fond of
adventure. I will go on.”

“I, too,” responded Jaques briefly.

“You are good fellows, both of you. I shall pray for your safe return,”
Denys said, much moved by their devotion.

“And we have no sweethearts,” subjoined Pierre with a touch of mirth.
“But if I could find one as beautiful and sweet as Madame Marchand I
should be paid for a journey up to Green Bay.”

“It might be dangerous,” said Denys sadly.

He wondered if it was really Mère Lunde they had set free. It would be
against her will, he was sure, and it would leave the two quite
defenceless. A thousand remembrances haunted him day and night. He could
see Renée’s soft brown eyes in the dusk, he could hear her sweet voice
in the gentle zephyrs, that changed and had no end of fascinating tones.
All her arch, pretty moods came up before him, her little piquant
jealousies, her pretty assumptions of dignity and power, her dainty,
authoritative ways. Oh, he could not give her up, his little darling.

There was sorrow in more than one household in old St. Louis, but time
softened and healed it. And now the inhabitants congratulated themselves
on their freedom heretofore from raids like these. Towns had been
destroyed, prisoners had been treated to almost every barbarity. Giving
up their lives had not been the worst.

But the summer came on gloriously, and Colonel Chouteau made many plans
for the advancement of the town. He was repairing the old house where
his friend had lived, and improving the grounds, and everyone felt that
in him they had a true friend.

One July day three worn and weary people came in at the northern gate,
and after the guards had looked sharply at them there was a shout of
joy. Pierre Duchesne, whose family had lived on a faint hope, young
Normand Fleurey, and Mère Lunde, looking a decade older and more
wrinkled than ever.

She sat down on a stone and wept while the sounds of joy and
congratulation were all about her.

Who could give her any comfort? She suffered Gaspard Denys’s pain as
well as her own. And though there had been adventures and hiding from
roving Indians, living on barks and roots, she could not tell them over
while her heart was so sore.

She went to the old house, where the three had known so much content.

“He will come back some day,” she said, “but the child—” and her voice
would break at that.

She heard Marchand had been very ill with a fever, beside the wounds. He
had come near to losing his leg, and was still a little lame, and very
weak and heartbroken. His wife had been torn from his arms when an
Indian had given him the blow on his head with a club, and there memory
had stopped. Though Mère Lunde would talk to no one else, to him she
told the sad story. And he had been lying helpless all the time
Wawataysee had been in such danger! Yes, he knew what would happen to
her now, but presently he would go up to the strait and never rest until
he had killed all who worked her ill. Oh, if she had fallen into the
hands of her old tribe!

That thought was madness. But he understood what the courage of her
despair would be. She would not suffer any degradation, death would be a
boon instead. Ah, if he could have joined Denys! He knew the cruelty and
treachery of those whose hands she had fallen into. And the child!

But it would be useless to start disabled as he was, although his anger
was fierce enough, and Denys was well on the journey. Yet it was
terrible to wait with awful visions before his eyes. He had seen both
men and women tortured, and the agonies prolonged with fiendish delight.

Mère Lunde opened the house and cleared up the dust and disorder. The
garden was overgrown with weeds and everything was running riot.
Marchand insisted upon lending a helping hand here. Many an evening they
sat in the doorway wondering, hoping and despairing.




CHAPTER IX

PRISONERS


The wild cry of “The Indians! the Indians!” had roused a small group
from their desultory enjoyment. They were pouring down in what seemed a
countless throng. Marchand had no weapon except his knife.

“Run,” he cried. “Make for the fort! Keep at the edge of the wood while
we can!”

Wawataysee seized Renée’s hand. The Indian girl was as fleet as a deer.
She could have saved herself, but she would not leave the child. They
had now reached the open. All was screams and confusion and flying
fugitives.

A tall Indian was behind them with a club. Wawataysee gave a wild shriek
and the next instant stumbled over her husband’s prostrate body. The
Indian rushed on.

“Oh!” cried Renée in wild affright, standing still in terror, the flying
crowd like swirling leaves before her eyes.

The sharp crack of a rifle made her spring back. Were both killed now?
But Wawataysee moved, groaned.

“They have shot him now, my beloved!” She raised the bleeding head and
pressed it to her bosom. “Oh, he has been killed, I know. Why did I not
die with him? Oh, Renée—”

Escape now was as impossible as succor. The Indian girl moaned over her
husband, and made a futile attempt to drag him back to the edge of the
wood to hide him. But suddenly she was violently wrenched away, and an
Indian with a hand hold of each began to run with them toward the river.
At last Renée fell and he had to pause. Meanwhile the firing from the
fort had begun with its execution.

Wawataysee began to plead with her captor, who turned a deaf ear to her
entreaties. Renée was crying in a desperate fashion, from both fright
and fatigue. He raised his club, but the young wife clasped the child in
her arms.

“Kill us both,” she exclaimed, “as you have already killed my husband.”

“White man?” with a grunt. “Squaw woman. Make some Indian glad.” Other
prisoners were being brought in this direction, and among them Mère
Lunde, who had started to reach the fort and bear the tidings to
Gaspard.

“Oh, my dear child,” she cried. “The good God help us. They are trying
to take the town.” And she almost fell at their feet.

Then they were marched on, the Indian guards behind with clubs and
tomahawks, now and then goaded by a light blow that would not disable.
The cries grew fainter, though they still heard the roar of the cannon.

And now the sun was slanting westward and the trees cast long shadows,
the sound of the river fell on their ears mingled with the homeward song
of birds. The heat began to wane, the air was dewy sweet.

It was almost dusk when they reached the boats, and they were bidden to
get in and were conveyed to the opposite shore. Here they were bound
together, two and two, with their hands fastened behind them. One Indian
was detailed to watch them while the others took the boats back.

Ducharme’s arm hung helplessly by his side, and the English renegades
began to upbraid him, while the Indians, seeing that no pillage was
possible and no gain could be made, drew away sullenly and began to
march toward the rendezvous, leaving some of their own badly wounded
behind. It was midnight before they rejoined the others. Then, fearing
pursuit, they started up the river again, rousing those who had fallen
asleep. All told they had barely thirty prisoners, and had left as many
of their own behind.

Mère Lunde had been allowed near the two girls, and now they huddled
together in the boat. Renée had fallen asleep again.

“You do not know where they will take us?” Mère Lunde inquired.

Wawataysee shook her head. “They will go up the Illinois River,” she
whispered.

“Do you think they will not follow?” in a low, desperate tone. “Master
Denys and—”

“Oh, _he_ is dead,” with a heart-breaking moan. “I held him to my heart
and he made no stir, I kissed his cold lips and there was no warmth. But
for the sweet child I should have begged them to kill me too, so that my
spirit should be with his. If she could be restored safely, my own life
I would hold as nothing.”

“They have started ere this. Do not despair,” and her lips were close to
the Indian girl’s ear.

“Then I shall thank the Great Spirit for the child’s sake.” Heaven grant
they might be rescued.

The stir and lap of the river and the boats had a mysterious sound in
the weird darkness. Then the cry of some wild animal or a bit of wind
sweeping through the trees at the edge, here and there. The stars shone
out overhead. Mère Lunde dropped asleep also. But Wawataysee sat with
wide-open eyes. One moment she said to herself that he could not be
dead, the next his white face and half-closed, dulled eyes were against
her breast. She felt as if she must shriek and tear her hair, but there
was the Indian’s self-control, and the thought of her companions who
might be made to suffer for her. But she could not go out of life for
her own satisfaction merely, unless it came to the martyrdom worse than
death, for the child was a sacred charge. Gaspard Denys would go to the
death, even, for both of them, and she was grateful for all the kindness
and countenance he had given her at St. Louis.

They turned up a small stream, tributary to the Illinois. At noon they
drew the boats up to what looked like an impenetrable brushwood, and
disembarked, pulling in the boats and canoes. There was a sort of
trodden path through the wild shrubbery, and tangled vines overhung it.
Two of the Indians went ahead, the prisoners were driven next, and the
rest of the party brought up the rear.

“Oh, where are we going?” cried Renée in affright, clutching
Wawataysee’s dress with both hands.

The girl shook her head.

They were stiff from their cramped position in the boats and faint from
hunger. Now and then one received a blow and an admonition to hurry on.
At length they came in sight of a clearing, an Indian settlement, with
wigwams and a space planted with corn. Women were moving about over
their fires, children playing or stretched out in the sun. Skins were
tacked from tree to tree drying, and several women were busy making
garments and leggings, some young girls cutting fringes. It was a
pretty, restful scene to the tired travellers.

An old man rose, it almost seemed from the earth itself. He was thin and
gaunt, hollow-cheeked and wrinkled to the last degree. From his attire
and his head-dress of feathers one could gather that he was the chief of
the small settlement.

“Why all this warlike array and these prisoners?” he asked sharply. “We
are at peace with our white brothers. We have gathered in the remnant of
our tribe, we have few young braves among us, we are mostly women and
children. We have nothing to be despoiled of, we do no hunting save for
ourselves.”

“We want only a little food and rest, good father Neepawa. We will not
molest you and yours. We are going up to the Great Lakes. We have been
led astray by a white chief who promised us much plunder, but the town
was too strong for us. He has gone south to one of the English forts and
taken some of his followers, leaving the prisoners with us. Give us some
food and we will go on.”

Their request was acceded to, but with no special cordiality. The thing
they would most have liked was whiskey, but that was not to be supplied
at this simple Indian village.

“Oh, if we could stay here!” sighed Renée. “Do you know where they mean
to take us?” and her eyes dilated with fear.

“Only that we are going farther north.”

Wawataysee was fain to have some conversation with the Indian women, but
she soon saw that every effort was adroitly frustrated. Still, they were
fed abundantly and some provisions given the party. They reembarked late
in the afternoon and made their way down to the Illinois River and up
farther on their journey, until their provisions were gone, when they
were obliged to land again.

After foraging about awhile they met a party of Indians and traders
quite plentifully supplied with whiskey. This led to quarrels and
disputes. A number of them were tired of having the prisoners to feed,
and had changed their minds about going north. They were roving Indians
who had no strong ties anywhere. Half a dozen decided to cast in their
lot with the traders.

And now those going on picked out the most likely of the prisoners. Some
of the strong young men who would be useful in the capacity of slaves,
one half-breed woman who had astuteness enough to make herself of
account in preparing food and did not resent the small indignities
offered.

As they marched down to the river’s edge these were first put on the
boat. Then Wawataysee and the child. Mère Lunde started to follow, but
was rudely thrust back.

“I must, I must!” she shrieked, struggling with her captor; “I must stay
with the child!”

“Push off!” was the command. Three Indians stepped in and the boat was
propelled out in the stream. Then Wawataysee saw what had happened and
half rose, crying wildly that they should take on the poor creature
begging in her desperation.

“She is ours! We cannot do without her!”

The Indian pushed her down on her seat and uttered a rough threat.

“Oh, what will they do with her?” shrieked Renée.

A blow was the only answer. Renée fell into her companion’s lap sobbing
wildly. Wawataysee tried to soothe and comfort her. But she felt
strangely defenceless. The half-breed she mistrusted. If there could be
some escape! She studied every point. They were no longer bound, but out
here on the river one could do nothing.

So passed another night and day and a second night. No place of refuge
had been found in their brief landings. But they reached another
settlement, not as orderly or inviting as that of Chief Neepawa. Still,
they were glad of a rest. And now their captors seemed undecided again.
Two or three were already tired of the journey with its hardships.

An Indian woman found a place in her wigwam for the two girls. They were
bound at night and their keeper had strict injunctions about them.

The Elk Horn, as one of the most authoritative Indians was called, now
assumed the command. He had an idea, that he kept quite to himself, that
he might dispose of his prisoners to some advantage, to make up in part
for the ill-advised raid on St. Louis. There were many roving Indians
about whose tribes had been decimated by wars and sickness, and who
attached themselves to the English or American cause, whichever offered
the most profit, and who liked a lawless, wandering life and plunder.

The keeper seemed kindly disposed toward the two girls and treated them
well, though she watched them sharply. Wawataysee had been careful to
talk in a patois of broken French and the Sioux that she had picked up.
She understood nearly all that her captors said and thus held them at a
disadvantage, but she could not learn what Elk Horn’s plans were, if
indeed he had any certain ones. She admitted that she had left a husband
in St. Louis, for there were moments when she could not believe him
dead, and that this was the end of their tender love! And she was young,
she had just tasted of the sweetness of it all.

There were hours of heart-break, when it seemed as if she could not
endure Renée’s prattle, and would fain shake off the soft touch on her
arm, the kisses on her forehead, for the awful, desperate want of the
other kisses, the other clasp. And oh, how strong the longing was at
times to throw herself headlong into the river and let her spirit of
love fly to that other land, that the good God provided for His
children.

Then she would think of Gaspard Denys and his love for the little maid.
He had seen enough of the cruelty of her race to know the danger. Ah,
why had the great All-Father allowed any human beings to become such
fiends? Up in her northern home she had heard things that turned the
blood to ice. And she had been so near the white settlements.

Yes, she must care for the little one, keep with her, befriend her, try
to restore her to her dear protector.

It was best to claim that Renée was her little sister by adoption. If
they could only get back! Why should they go up north? What was that
more than any other place!

The woman at this would shake her head doubtfully. Yet Wawataysee could
see that she softened, and once she asked how far it was to St. Louis,
and how one could get there.

Wawataysee’s heart beat high with hope. Yet how could two girls reach
there alone? They might meet other Indian bands who would capture them.
There were wild animals. And they might not get a canoe. They had no
money. Still, she would escape if they could and pray to the good God to
keep them safe. Often and often she and Renée comforted themselves with
the sweet, brief prayers they had learned. And oh, where was poor Mère
Lunde!

Several days of rest were vouchsafed to them. Then one day a company of
hunters joined them, among which there were a few white prisoners as
well. One, a young fellow, strolled about with evident curiosity, and
came upon the girls in a leafy covert near the wig-wam. They were given
a little liberty by their keeper on promising by the Great Manitou they
would not attempt to escape.

“It would be of no use,” said the woman. “An alarm would be given, and
you do not know your way anywhere. Then you might be beaten when you
were captured, and confined with thongs. Have patience. Sometimes all
the braves go off to hunt.”

The young man listened to the French with delight. Two of the other
captives were English and they had conversed mostly with signs and
Indian words they had picked up.

Renée heard a stir in the leaves and started with a little cry. The hand
was raised for silence.

“Pardon me. I will do you no harm,” he said, with an appeal in his
voice. “It was the language that sounded so sweet to me. I am French. I
come from Detroit. But we fell in with a band of Indians and only three
of us escaped unhurt. We were made prisoners.”

“And we are prisoners, too,” returned Wawataysee, with a sigh. “We come
from St. Louis.”

“St. Louis! How strange! I had meant to go there. I have an uncle,
Pierre Valbonais.”

“Oh, I know!” cried Renée with delight, as if she had found a friend.
“He comes in my uncle’s shop; and Uncle Gaspard likes him. They sit and
smoke together.”

“And I am André Valbonais. We are companions in adversity, both
prisoners. Whither are you going?”

Wawataysee shook her head. “We do not know, m’sieu.”

He laughed softly. “How natural that sounds! I am glad to hear a
familiar voice. Neither do I know my destination. It is one thing
to-day, another to-morrow. I do not think they know themselves. Black
Feather is chief of the gang. Now and then they quarrel. He killed two
Indians not more than a week ago who wanted to have their own way, but
he has not been cruel to us. Still, I dream of escape continually.”

“Ah, if we could compass it together!” and Wawataysee’s beautiful eyes
went to his very heart.

The woman came out with her beadwork in her hand.

“You are not of our people,” she said. “You have no right here. Go your
way.”

“Perhaps not. I am a sort of compulsory guest, but I will say adieu,”
and bowing, he disappeared in the shrubbery; but his last glance said he
would find them again.

“Who was it?” The woman looked from one to the other.

“He is French, and a prisoner. The chief is Black Feather. But the young
man comes from Detroit.”

She gave a nod, as if she knew this much already.

Elk Horn and Black Feather had cemented a friendship over their whiskey.
They would start the next morning. The word was given to be early astir,
and the woman roused them.

“Every step takes us farther away,” said Wawataysee regretfully. Yet
they would be in the company of Valbonais, who had resolved upon escape.

She walked slowly down to the river’s edge, holding Renée by the hand.
Black Feather caught sight of her. Her tall, lithe figure, her airy
step, the poise of the head, had a touch of familiarity. Ah, yes! and
the name. The pretty Firefly had been taken away from the strait by a
white trader, and her brother had been unsuccessful in his attempt to
capture her. Ah, if this was she, then he was truly in luck!

He did not attempt to come nearer, but saw her and the child step into
the boat. Elk Horn took command of this. Black Feather gathered his
small force together, and his boatload of treasures of different kinds
with which he could purchase supplies, and the other looked on with
envy.

All day Black Feather watched warily, more and more certain that this
girl would prove a treasure to him if he managed rightly. He would buy
her of Elk Horn.

“What do you know about her?” he inquired. “She comes from St. Louis.
Who was her father? for she has Indian blood, and I am sure I know her
tribe.”

Elk Horn looked amazed. “I believe she married a trader and came with
him. I will ask her.”

“No. Cannot some of the men tell you?”

“Oh, I think so. Have you been smitten with her charms?”

The Indian nodded, but his face showed no emotion.

They made a rude camp for the night and proceeded to cook some supper.

“I have found out,” announced Elk Horn. “A Frenchman, Marchand, married
her. He was killed, I believe, in the assault on the town.”

“Yes, I like her. I will buy her of you. Let us make a bargain.”

“And the little one?” inquiringly.

“Oh, I do not want her. Yet she has some beauty, according to pale-face
ideas. But no, I will take only the Indian girl.”

They ate their supper of broiled fish, and then smoked in the gathering
darkness. Elk Horn deliberated. He had not exactly thought of selling
her, though it was often done with female captives. He had two wives
now, and did not want to be burdened with a third who was a helpless
young girl. Wives were for profit, in his estimation.

Black Feather was as wary. He was not sure he wanted to marry her. She
might prove turbulent and headstrong. Half breeds were not as tractable
as Indian women. And they were not as strong. They might die on your
hands, and what, then, would one have for the bargain?

“You will take the child. I will not part them. You can spare a trifle
more. She will soon grow up.”

Black Feather shrugged his shoulders and was silent.

“Then there is no bargain,” declared Elk Horn. “I will offer my wares to
some other chief. I think of one farther up in the Illinois country. But
our ways may be together a few days longer. It need not make ill
friends.”

Black Feather brought out some whiskey. He knew how to tempt his
brother. To have a supply of this for days would be more satisfying than
any future gain. For the present was the great thing to the Indian’s
improvident nature. And so Black Feather made his bargain, including the
child that he really did not care for. Yet perhaps it would be better
not to separate them at present.

Elk Horn had not slept off all his potion. His compeer was awake early,
and had laid aside the promised treasures for his inspection. Then he
called his men and stealthily manned his own boats. He judged rightly
that Elk Horn would not leave the place until the last drop of firewater
had been drained, and then it would take him a few days to get over his
debauch.

“Come,” he exclaimed roughly, at length. “Here is your portion—beads,
wampum, skins and whiskey.”

Elk Horn nodded and rubbed his bleared eyes. He looked at the goods and
they seemed magnified to his sight, so adroitly were they spread about.

“Ugh! It is early,” with a yawn.

“I must be on my way. You can overtake me at night. We will share the
same fire, and I will have everything prepared for my brother. But I
wish you to rouse the two captives and have them ready also. You will
lead them to the boat, so there need be no disturbance.”

Elk Horn considered. Wawataysee might object to her new master. He felt
his part had been rather underhand, but was she not his property?

They were a little surprised at the summons, and to be hurried off
without breakfast. The canoes were already out in the river. The larger
boat had a few men in it. Elk Horn put in Renée first.

“Where are we going?” the Indian girl asked, turning toward him.

“Up the river,” roughly, in a thick, guttural voice. “Come, get in.”

She stepped aboard, not especially remarking the men. Then suddenly her
eye fell upon Valbonais, who greeted her with a joyous expression. Had
he been handed over to Elk Horn? She experienced a certain contentment,
and suspicion was allayed.

But as they emerged from the shadow of the overhanging trees she saw
that all the faces were strange. She had not noted the newcomers in the
camp, having been kept in seclusion, and it also being her choice. Now a
chill of terror ran over her. Noting the aspect of two of the rowers
more closely, she saw to her dismay that they were Hurons. One man had
his head turned from her and bowed down.

“Why do we go so early?” asked Renée. “And we have had no breakfast.”

“I do not know,” tremblingly.

“And why did Elk Horn stay on shore?”

“Did he?” with a curious lift of the brows.

“Oh, yes; I saw him. And these men—oh, where are Pierre and Jules? But
there is the young man who came and talked to us. Oh, Wawataysee, shall
we never stay anywhere again? How can we get back to St. Louis?”

“Hush, dear; hush!”

“But I am getting hungry. And I am so tired of sailing.”

She leaned her head down on Wawataysee’s lap. Every moment the Indian
girl grew more terrified. True, Elk Horn and his men might come on. But
these Hurons!

The boat glided along. The sun rose higher and made of the river a band
of gold and gems, where each little wavelet dazzled in strange colors.
They passed great plains where grass grew rank and waved in the wind
like another sea of green. Then a belt of pines or walnut, the first
standing stiff and strong, the others mound-like.

The bowed figure had straightened itself and spoken to the men, but not
turned his face. Now he gave an order and the boat swerved in toward the
shore, grating a little on the pebbly beach. The other one in advance
turned also. Some food was distributed. He spoke in the Huron language,
and said they must make Bear Creek by night.

It was dreadful to go out in the broiling sun again, but presently a
cooling breeze blew up. They passed a chain of boats well laden, going
down, the French sailors singing a merry lilt, and they gave each other
greeting. The shadows began to grow longer and a reviving fragrance was
wafted over from the shore edge. There were fields abloom with gay
flowers, then shrubby clumps, and when the sun went down they had neared
a little cove where one could see two rather dilapidated wigwams. Here
they were to stop for the night.

The men began to make a fire, while provisions were brought out of the
boat. The two girls had been left alone, but now the chief—Wawataysee
knew he was that by his dress and a long black feather stuck through the
topknot of hair—turned to her. Oh, then she was quite sure she had seen
him before and her heart stood still. Yes, it was in that life she had
fled from.

He addressed her in the Huron tongue; she answered irrelevantly in
French. A frown crossed his brow, but he handed them both out of the
boat with a firm grasp on the arm of each, and led them to the smaller
tent of the two. Some fir and hemlock branches had been thrown on the
ground and covered with a blanket.

“You and the child will be safe here. You will be well guarded,” with a
cruel little smile. “Some supper will be sent you. Compose yourself.”

She gave no sign of recognition.

“You cannot deceive me, Firefly of the Hurons, even if some French blood
does course in your veins and you are tricked out in this attire. Your
brother’s anger was kindled against you when you made him break his
word, when you ran off with a vile Frenchman

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/41526