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The Crossing, a novel by Winston Churchill |
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Book 2. Flotsam And Jetsam - Chapter 12. Les Isles |
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_ Book II. Flotsam And Jetsam Chapter XII. Les Isles I stood staring at the portrait, I say, with a kind of fascination that astonished me, seeing that it had come to me in such a way. It was no French face of my imagination, and as I looked it seemed to me that I knew Mademoiselle Helene de Saint-Gre. And yet I smile as I write this, realizing full well that my strange and foreign surroundings and my unforeseen adventure had much to do with my state of mind. The lady in the miniature might have been eighteen, or thirty-five. Her features were of the clearest cut, the nose the least trifle aquiline, and by a blurred outline the painter had given to the black hair piled high upon the head a suggestion of waviness. The eyebrows were straight, the brown eyes looked at the world with an almost scornful sense of humor, and I marked that there was determination in the chin. Here was a face that could be infinitely haughty or infinitely tender, a mouth of witty--nay, perhaps cutting--repartee of brevity and force. A lady who spoke quickly, moved quickly, or reposed absolutely. A person who commanded by nature and yet (dare I venture the thought?) was capable of a supreme surrender. I was aroused from this odd revery by footsteps on the gallery, and Nick burst into the room. Without pausing to look about him, he flung himself lengthwise on the bed on top of the mosquito bar. "A thousand curses on such a place," he cried; "it is full of rat holes and rabbit warrens." "Did you catch your man?" I asked innocently. "Catch him!" said Nick, with a little excusable profanity; "he went in at one end of such a warren and came out at another. I waited for him in two streets until an officious person chanced along and threatened to take me before the Alcalde. What the devil is that you have got in your hand, Davy?" he demanded, raising his head. "A miniature that took my fancy, and which I bought." He rose from the bed, yawned, and taking it in his hand, held it to the light. I watched him curiously. "Lord," he said, "it is such a passion as I might have suspected of you, Davy." "There was nothing said about passion," I answered "Then why the deuce did you buy it?" he said with some pertinence. This staggered me. "A man may fancy a thing, without indulging in a passion, I suppose," I replied. Nick held the picture at arm's length in the palm of his hand and regarded it critically. "Faith," said he, "you may thank heaven it is only a picture. If such a one ever got hold of you, Davy, she would general you even as you general me. Egad," he added with a laugh, "there would be no more walking the streets at night in search of adventure for you. Consider carefully the masterful features of that lady and thank God you haven't got her." I was inclined to be angry, but ended by laughing. "There will be no rivalry between us, at least," I said. "Rivalry!" exclaimed Nick. "Heaven forbid that I should aspire to such abject slavery. When I marry, it will be to command." "All the more honor in such a conquest," I suggested. "Davy," said he, "I have long been looking for some such flaw in your insuperable wisdom. But I vow I can keep my eyes open no longer. Benjy!" A smothered response came from the other side of the wall, and Benjy duly appeared in the doorway, blinking at the candlelight, to put his master to bed. We slept that night with no bed covering save the mosquito bar, as was the custom in New Orleans. Indeed, the heat was most oppressive, but we had become to some extent inured to it on the boat, and we were both in such sound health that our slumbers were not disturbed. Early in the morning, however, I was awakened by a negro song from the court-yard, and I lay pleasantly for some minutes listening to the early sounds, breathing in the aroma of coffee which mingled with the odor of the flowers of the court, until Zoey herself appeared in the doorway, holding a cup in her hand. I arose, and taking the miniature from the table, gazed at it in the yellow morning light; and then, having dressed myself, I put it carefully in my pocket and sat down at my portfolio to compose a letter to Polly Ann, knowing that a description of what I had seen in New Orleans would amuse her. This done, I went out into the gallery, where Madame was already seated at her knitting, in the shade of the great tree that stood in the corner of the court and spread its branches over the eaves. She arose and courtesied, with a questioning smile. "Madame," I asked, "is it too early to present myself to Monsieur de Saint-Gre?" "Pardieu, no, Monsieur, we are early risers in the South for we have our siesta. You are going to return the portrait, Monsieur?" I nodded. "God bless you for the deed," said she. "Tenez, Monsieur," she added, stepping closer to me, "you will tell his father that you bought it from Monsieur Auguste?" I saw that she had a soft spot in her heart for the rogue. "I will make no promises, Madame," I answered. She looked at me timidly, appealingly, but I bowed and departed. The sun was riding up into the sky, the walls already glowing with his heat, and a midsummer languor seemed to pervade the streets as I walked along. The shadows now were sharply defined, the checkered foliage of the trees was flung in black against the yellow-white wall of the house with the lions, and the green-latticed gallery which we had watched the night before seemed silent and deserted. I knocked at the gate, and presently a bright-turbaned gardienne opened it. Was Monsieur de Saint-Gre at home. The gardienne looked me over, and evidently finding me respectable, replied with many protestations of sorrow that he was not, that he had gone with Mamselle very early that morning to his country place at Les Iles. This information I extracted with difficulty, for I was not by any means versed in the negro patois. As I walked back to Madame Bouvet's I made up my mind that there was but the one thing to do, to go at once to Monsieur de Saint-Gre's plantation. Finding Madame still waiting in the gallery, I asked her to direct me thither. "You have but to follow the road that runs southward along the levee, and some three leagues will bring you to it, Monsieur. You will inquire for Monsieur de Saint-Gre." "Can you direct me to Mr. Daniel Clark's?" I asked. "The American merchant and banker, the friend and associate of the great General Wilkinson whom you sent down to us last year? Certainly, Monsieur. He will no doubt give you better advice than I on this matter." I found Mr. Clark in his counting-room, and I had not talked with him five minutes before I began to suspect that, if a treasonable understanding existed between Wilkinson and the Spanish government, Mr. Clark was innocent of it. He being the only prominent American in the place, it was natural that Wilkinson should have formed with him a business arrangement to care for the cargoes he sent down. Indeed, after we had sat for some time chatting together, Mr. Clark began himself to make guarded inquiries on this very subject. Did I know Wilkinson? How was his enterprise of selling Kentucky products regarded at home? But I do not intend to burden this story with accounts of a matter which, though it has never been wholly clear, has been long since fairly settled in the public mind. Mr. Clark was most amiable, accepted my statement that I was travelling for pleasure, and honored Monsieur Chouteau's bon (for my purchase of the miniature had deprived me of nearly all my ready money), and said that Mr. Temple and I would need horses to get to Les Iles. "And unless you purpose going back to Kentucky by keel boat, or round by sea to Philadelphia or New York, and cross the mountains," he said, "you will need good horses for your journey through Natchez and the Cumberland country. There is a consignment of Spanish horses from the westward just arrived in town," he added, "and I shall be pleased to go with you to the place where they are sold. I shall not presume to advise a Kentuckian on such a purchase." The horses were crowded together under a dirty shed near the levee, and the vessel from which they had been landed rode at anchor in the river. They were the scrawny, tough ponies of the plains, reasonably cheap, and it took no great discernment on my part to choose three of the strongest and most intelligent looking. We went next to a saddler's, where I selected three saddles and bridles of Spanish workmanship, and Mr. Clark agreed to have two of his servants meet us with the horses before Madame Bouvet's within the hour. He begged that we would dine with him when we returned from Les Iles. "You will not find an island, Mr. Ritchie," he said; "Saint-Gre's plantation is a huge block of land between the river and a cypress swamp behind. Saint-Gre is a man with a wonderful quality of mind, who might, like his ancestors, have made his mark if necessity had probed him or opportunity offered. He never forgave the Spanish government for the murder of his father, nor do I blame him. He has his troubles. His son is an incurable rake and degenerate, as you may have heard." I went back to Madame Bouvet's, to find Nick emerging from his toilet. "What deviltry have you been up to, Davy?" he demanded. "I have been to the House of the Lions to see your divinity," I answered, "and in a very little while horses will be here to carry us to her." "What do you mean?" he asked, grasping me by both shoulders. "I mean that we are going to her father's plantation, some way down the river." "On my honor, Davy, I did not suspect you of so much enterprise," he cried. "And her husband--?" "Does not exist," I replied. "Perhaps, after all, I might be able to give you instruction in the conduct of an adventure. The man you chased with such futility was her brother, and he stole from her the miniature of which I am now the fortunate possessor." He stared at me for a moment in rueful amazement. "And her name?" he demanded. "Antoinette de Saint-Gre," I answered; "our letter is to her father." He made me a rueful bow. "I fear that I have undervalued you, Mr. Ritchie," he said. "You have no peer. I am unworthy to accompany you, and furthermore, it would be useless." "And why useless!" I inquired, laughing. "You have doubtless seen the lady, and she is yours, said he. "You forget that I am in love with a miniature," I said. In half an hour we were packed and ready, the horses had arrived, we bade good-by to Madame Bouvet and rode down the miry street until we reached the road behind the levee. Turning southward, we soon left behind the shaded esplanade and the city's roofs below us, and came to the first of the plantation houses set back amidst the dark foliage. No tremor shook the fringe of moss that hung from the heavy boughs, so still was the day, and an indefinable, milky haze stretched between us and the cloudless sky above. The sun's rays pierced it and gathered fire; the mighty river beside us rolled listless and sullen, flinging back the heat defiantly. And on our left was a tropical forest in all its bewildering luxuriance, the live-oak, the hackberry, the myrtle, the Spanish bayonet in bristling groups, and the shaded places gave out a scented moisture like an orangery; anon we passed fields of corn and cotton, swamps of rice, stretches of poverty-stricken indigo plants, gnawed to the stem by the pest. Our ponies ambled on, unmindful; but Nick vowed that no woman under heaven would induce him to undertake such a journey again. Some three miles out of the city we descried two figures on horseback coming towards us, and quickly perceived that one was a gentleman, the other his black servant. They were riding at a more rapid pace than the day warranted, but the gentleman reined in his sweating horse as he drew near to us, eyed us with a curiosity tempered by courtesy, bowed gravely, and put his horse to a canter again. "Phew!" said Nick, twisting in his saddle, "I thought that all Creoles were lazy." "We have met the exception, perhaps," I answered. "Did you take in that man?" "His looks were a little remarkable, come to think of it," answered Nick, settling down into his saddle again. Indeed, the man's face had struck me so forcibly that I was surprised out of an inquiry which I had meant to make of him, namely, how far we were from the Saint-Gre plantation. We pursued our way slowly, from time to time catching a glimpse of a dwelling almost hid in the distant foliage, until at length we came to a place a little more pretentious than those which we had seen. From the road a graceful flight of wooden steps climbed the levee and descended on the far side to a boat landing, and a straight vista cut through the grove, lined by wild orange trees, disclosed the white pillars and galleries of a far-away plantation house. The grassy path leading through the vista was trimly kept, and on either side of it in the moist, green shade of the great trees flowers bloomed in a profusion of startling colors,--in splotches of scarlet and white and royal purple. Nick slipped from his horse. "Behold the mansion of Mademoiselle de Saint-Gre," said he, waving his hand up the vista. "How do you know?" I asked. "I am told by a part of me that never lies, Davy," he answered, laying his hand upon his heart; "and besides," he added, "I should dislike devilishly to go too far on such a day and have to come back again." "We will rest here," I said, laughing, "and send in Benjy to find out." "Davy," he answered, with withering contempt, "you have no more romance in you than a turnip. We will go ourselves and see what befalls." "Very well, then," I answered, falling in with his humor, "we will go ourselves." He brushed his face with his handkerchief, gave himself a pull here and a pat there, and led the way down the alley. But we had not gone far before he turned into a path that entered the grove on the right, and to this likewise I made no protest. We soon found ourselves in a heavenly spot,--sheltered from the sun's rays by a dense verdure,--and no one who has not visited these Southern country places can know the teeming fragrance there. One shrub (how well I recall it!) was like unto the perfume of all the flowers and all the fruits, the very essence of the delicious languor of the place that made our steps to falter. A bird shot a bright flame of color through the checkered light ahead of us. Suddenly a sound brought us to a halt, and we stood in a tense and wondering silence. The words of a song, sung carelessly in a clear, girlish voice, came to us from beyond. "We have come at the very zenith of opportunity," I whispered. "Hush!" he said. "Je ne veux pas d'un avocat,
"Helas, Mademoiselle," he said, "je ne suis pas officier, mais on peut arranger tout cela, sans doute." My breath was taken away by this unheard-of audacity, and I braced myself against screams, flight, and other feminine demonstrations of terror. The young lady did nothing of the kind. She turned her back to us, leaned against the tree, and to my astonishment I saw her slim shoulders shaken with laughter. At length, very slowly, she looked around, and in her face struggled curiosity and fear and merriment. Nick made another bow, worthy of Versailles, and she gave a frightened little laugh. "You are English, Messieurs--yes?" she ventured. "We were once!" cried Nick, "but we have changed, Mademoiselle." "Et quoi donc?" relapsing into her own language. "Americans," said he. "Allow me to introduce to you the Honorable David Ritchie, whom you rejected a few moments ago." "Whom I rejected?" she exclaimed. "Alas," said Nick, with a commiserating glance at me, "he has the misfortune to be a lawyer." Mademoiselle shot at me the swiftest and shyest of glances, and turned to us once more her quivering shoulders. There was a brief silence. "Mademoiselle?" said Nick, taking a step on the garden path. "Monsieur?" she answered, without so much as looking around. "What, now, would you take this gentleman to be?" he asked with an insistence not to be denied. Again she was shaken with laughter, and suddenly to my surprise she turned and looked full at me. "In English, Monsieur, you call it--a gallant?" My face fairly tingled, and I heard Nick laughing with unseemly merriment. "Ah, Mademoiselle," he cried, "you are a judge of character, and you have read him perfectly." "Then I must leave you, Messieurs," she answered, with her eyes in her lap. But she made no move to go. "You need have no fear of Mr. Ritchie, Mademoiselle," answered Nick, instantly. "I am here to protect you against his gallantry." This time Nick received the glance, and quailed before it. "And who--par exemple--is to protect me against--you, Monsieur?" she asked in the lowest of voices. "You forget that I, too, am unprotected--and vulnerable, Mademoiselle," he answered. Her face was hidden again, but not for long. "How did you come?" she demanded presently. "On air," he answered, "for we saw you in New Orleans yesterday." "And--why?" "Need you ask, Mademoiselle?" said the rogue, and then, with more effrontery than ever, he began to sing:-- She rose, her sewing falling to the ground, and took a few startled steps towards us. "Monsieur! you will be heard," she cried. "And put out of the Garden of Eden," said Nick. "I must leave you," she said, with the quaintest of English pronunciation. Yet she stood irresolute in the garden path, a picture against the dark green leaves and the flowers. Her age might have been seventeen. Her gown was of some soft and light material printed in buds of delicate color, her slim arms bare above the elbow. She had the ivory complexion of the province, more delicate than I had yet seen, and beyond that I shall not attempt to describe her, save to add that she was such a strange mixture of innocence and ingenuousness and coquetry as I had not imagined. Presently her gaze was fixed seriously on me. "Do you think it very wrong, Monsieur?" she asked. I was more than taken aback by this tribute. "Oh," cried Nick, "the arbiter of etiquette!" "Since I am here, Mademoiselle," I answered, with anything but readiness, "I am not a proper judge." Her next question staggered me. "You are well-born?" she asked. "Mr. Ritchie's grandfather was a Scottish earl," said Nick, immediately, a piece of news that startled me into protest. "It is true, Davy, though you may not know it," he added. "And you, Monsieur?" she said to Nick. "I am his cousin,--is it not honor enough?" said he. "Yet you do not resemble one another." "Mr. Ritchie has all the good looks in the family," said Nick. "Oh!" cried the young lady, and this time she gave us her profile. "Come, Mademoiselle," said Nick, "since the fates have cast the die, let us all sit down in the shade. The place was made for us." "Monsieur!" she cried, giving back, "I have never in my life been alone with gentlemen." "But Mr. Ritchie is a duenna to satisfy the most exacting," said Nick; "when you know him better you will believe me." She laughed softly and glanced at me. By this time we were all three under the branches. "Monsieur, you do not understand the French customs. Mon Dieu, if the good Sister Lorette could see me now--" "But she is safe in the convent," said Nick. "Are they going to put glass on the walls?" "And why?" asked Mademoiselle, innocently. "Because," said Nick, "because a very bad man has come to New Orleans,--one who is given to climbing walls." "You?" "Yes. But when I found that a certain demoiselle had left the convent, I was no longer anxious to climb them." "And how did you know that I had left it?" I was at a loss to know whether this were coquetry or innocence. "Because I saw you on the levee," said Nick. "You saw me on the levee?" she repeated, giving back. "And I had a great fear," the rogue persisted. "A fear of what?" "A fear that you were married," he said, with a boldness that made me blush. As for Mademoiselle, a color that vied with the June roses charged through her cheeks. She stooped to pick up her sewing, but Nick was before her. "And why did you think me married?" she asked in a voice so low that we scarcely heard. "Faith," said Nick, "because you seemed to be quarrelling with a man." She turned to him with an irresistible seriousness. "And is that your idea of marriage, Monsieur?" This time it was I who laughed, for he had been hit very fairly. "Mademoiselle," said he, "I did not for a moment think it could have been a love match." Mademoiselle turned away and laughed. "You are the very strangest man I have ever seen," she said. "Shall I give you my notion of a love match, Mademoiselle?" said Nick. "I should think you might be well versed in the subject, Monsieur," she answered, speaking to the tree, "but here is scarcely the time and place." She wound up her sewing, and faced him. "I must really leave you," she said. He took a step towards her and stood looking down into her face. Her eyes dropped. "And am I never to see you again?" he asked. "Monsieur!" she cried softly, "I do not know who you are." She made him a courtesy, took a few steps in the opposite path, and turned. "That depends upon your ingenuity," she added; "you seem to have no lack of it, Monsieur." Nick was transported. "You must not go," he cried. "Must not? How dare you speak to me thus, Monsieur?" Then she tempered it. "There is a lady here whom I love, and who is ill. I must not be long from her bedside." "She is very ill?" said Nick, probably for want of something better. "She is not really ill, Monsieur, but depressed--is not that the word? She is a very dear friend, and she has had trouble--so much, Monsieur,--and my mother brought her here. We love her as one of the family." This was certainly ingenuous, and it was plain that the girl gave us this story through a certain nervousness, for she twisted her sewing in her fingers as she spoke. "Mademoiselle," said Nick, "I would not keep you from such an errand of mercy." She gave him a grateful look, more dangerous than any which had gone before. "And besides," he went on, "we have come to stay awhile with you, Mr. Ritchie and myself." "You have come to stay awhile?" she said. I thought it time that the farce were ended. "We have come with letters to your father, Monsieur de Saint-Gre, Mademoiselle," I said, "and I should like very much to see him, if he is at leisure." Mademoiselle stared at me in unfeigned astonishment. "But did you not meet him, Monsieur?" she demanded. "He left an hour ago for New Orleans. You must have met a gentleman riding very fast." It was my turn to be astonished. "But that was not your father!" I exclaimed. "Et pourquoi non?" she said. "Is not your father the stout gentleman whom I saw with you on the levee last evening?" I asked. She laughed. "You have been observing, Monsieur," she said. "That was my uncle, Monsieur de Beausejour. You saw me quarrelling with my brother, Auguste," she went on a little excitedly. "Oh, I am very much ashamed of it. I was so angry. My cousin, Mademoiselle Helene de Saint-Gre, has just sent me from France such a beautiful miniature, and Auguste fell in love with it." "Fell in love with it!" I exclaimed involuntarily. "You should see it, Monsieur, and I think you also would fall in love with it." "I have not a doubt of it," said Nick. Mademoiselle made the faintest of moues. "Auguste is very wild, as you say," she continued, addressing me, "he is a great care to my father. He intrigues, you know, he wishes Louisiane to become French once more,--as we all do. But I should not say this, Monsieur," she added in a startled tone. "You will not tell? No, I know you will not. We do not like the Spaniards. They killed my grandfather when they came to take the province. And once, the Governor-general Miro sent for my father and declared he would put Auguste in prison if he did not behave himself. But I have forgotten the miniature. When Auguste saw that he fell in love with it, and now he wishes to go to France and obtain a commission through our cousin, the Marquis of Saint-Gre, and marry Mademoiselle Helene." "A comprehensive programme, indeed," said Nick. "My father has gone back to New Orleans," she said, "to get the miniature from Auguste. He took it from me, Monsieur." She raised her head a little proudly. "If my brother had asked it, I might have given it to him, though I treasured it. But Auguste is so--impulsive. My uncle told my father, who is very angry. He will punish Auguste severely, and--I do not like to have him punished. Oh, I wish I had the miniature." "Your wish is granted, Mademoiselle," I answered, drawing the case from my pocket and handing it to her. She took it, staring at me with eyes wide with wonder, and then she opened it mechanically. "Monsieur," she said with great dignity, "do you mind telling me where you obtained this?" "I found it, Mademoiselle," I answered; and as I spoke I felt Nick's fingers on my arm. "You found it? Where? How, Monsieur?" "At Madame Bouvet's, the house where we stayed." "Oh," she said with a sigh of relief, "he must have dropped it. It is there where he meets his associates, where they talk of the French Louisiane." Again I felt Nick pinching me, and I gave a sigh of relief. Mademoiselle was about to continue, but I interrupted her. "How long will your father be in New Orleans, Mademoiselle?" I asked. "Until he finds Auguste," she answered. "It may be days, but he will stay, for he is very angry. But will you not come into the house, Messieurs, and be presented to my mother?" she asked. "I have been very--inhospitable," she added with a glance at Nick. We followed her through winding paths bordered by shrubs and flowers, and presently came to a low house surrounded by a wide, cool gallery, and shaded by spreading trees. Behind it were clustered the kitchens and quarters of the house servants. Mademoiselle, picking up her dress, ran up the steps ahead of us and turned to the left in the hall into a darkened parlor. The floor was bare, save for a few mats, and in the corner was a massive escritoire of mahogany with carved feet, and there were tables and chairs of a like pattern. It was a room of more distinction than I had seen since I had been in Charlestown, and reflected the solidity of its owners. "If you will be so kind as to wait here, Messieurs," said Mademoiselle, "I will call my mother." And she left us. I sat down, rather uncomfortably, but Nick took a stand and stood staring down at me with folded arms. "How I have undervalued you, Davy," he said. "I am not proud of it," I answered shortly. "What the deuce is to do now!" he asked. "I cannot linger here," I answered; "I have business with Monsieur de Saint-Gre, and I must go back to New Orleans at once." "Then I will wait for you," said Nick. "Davy, I have met my fate." I laughed in spite of myself. "It seems to me that I have heard that remark before," I answered. He had not time to protest, for we heard footsteps in the hall, and Mademoiselle entered, leading an older lady by the hand. In the light of the doorway I saw that she was thin and small and yellow, but her features had a regularity and her mien a dignity which made her impressing, which would have convinced a stranger that she was a person of birth and breeding. Her hair, tinged with gray, was crowned by a lace cap. "Madame," I said, bowing and coming forward, "I am David Ritchie, from Kentucky, and this is my cousin, Mr. Temple, of Charlestown. Monsieur Gratiot and Colonel Chouteau, of St. Louis, have been kind enough to give us letters to Monsieur de Saint-Gre." And I handed her one of the letters which I had ready. "You are very welcome, Messieurs," she answered, with the same delightful accent which her daughter had used, "and you are especially welcome from such a source. The friends of Colonel Chouteau and of Monsieur Gratiot are our friends. You will remain with us, I hope, Messieurs," she continued. "Monsieur de Saint-Gre will return in a few days at best." "By your leave, Madame, I will go to New Orleans at once and try to find Monsieur," I said, "for I have business with him." "You will return with him, I hope," said Madame. I bowed. "And Mr. Temple will remain?" she asked, with a questioning look at Nick. "With the greatest pleasure in the world, Madame," he answered, and there was no mistaking his sincerity. As he spoke, Mademoiselle turned her back on him. I would not wait for dinner, but pausing only for a sip of cool Madeira and some other refreshment, I made my farewells to the ladies. As I started out of the door to find Benjy, who had been waiting for more than an hour, Mademoiselle gave me a neatly folded note. "You will be so kind as to present that to my father, Monsieur," she said. _ |
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