“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.