Miladi was very capricious, Rose found, although she did not know the meaning of the word. What she wanted to-day she scouted to-morrow. Rose's reading was enough to set one wild. Sure she was not French-born, or she would know by intuition. Sometimes she would say pettishly, "Go away, child, you disturb me," and then Rose would play hide-and-seek with Pani, or run down to the Gaudrions. Marie was quite an expert in Indian embroidery, the children were gay and frolicsome, and there was a new baby. Pierre was very fond of her; a studious fellow, with queer ideas that often worked themselves out in some useful fashion. They read together, stumbling over words they could not understand.
"And I shall build a boat of my own and go out to those wonderful rapids. At one moment it feels as if you would be submerged, then you ride up on top with a shout. Cubenic said the Sieur stood it as bravely as any Indian. Why—if your boat was overturned you could swim."
"But there's a current that sucks you in. And there's a strange woman, a windigo, who haunts the rapids and drags you down and eats you."
"I don't believe such nonsense. In one of the Sieur's books there is a story of some people who believed there was a spirit in everything. There were gods of the waters, of the trees, of the winds, and the Indians are much like them. I've never found any of their gods, have you?"
"No"—rather reluctantly. "But Wanamee has. And sometimes they bring back dead people."
"Then they don't always eat them," and the boy laughed.
She had meant to tell miladi of her tryst and beg her to come out and see the star, but when she found her not only indifferent, but fretful, she refrained and was glad presently that she had this delicious secret to herself. But there was a great mystery. Sometimes the star was different. Instead of being golden, it was a pale blue, and then almost red. Was it that way in France, she wondered.
She came to have a strange fondness for the stars, and to note their changes. Was it true that the old people M'sieu Ralph had read about, the Greeks, had seen their gods and goddesses taken up to the sky and set in the blue? There were thrones mounted with gems, there were figures that chased each other; to-night they were here, to-morrow night somewhere else. But the star that came out first was hers, and she sent a message across the ocean with it. And the star said in return, "I am thinking of you."
He did think of her, and tried to trace out some parentage. Catherine Defroy had gone from St. Malo, a single woman. Then by all the accounts he could find she must have spent two years in Paris. Clearly she was not mother of the child.
After all, what did it matter? Rose would probably spend her life in New France. If it was never proven that she came of gentlefolks, Laurent Giffard would hardly consent to his wife's mothering her. He had a good deal of pride of birth.