“And then?” Petit Marc asked.
“Time enough to tell when the time comes.” Jeanne snapped her fingers as if to dismiss the subject.
Petit Marc stood shifting his cap from hand to hand. “Can’t I see him? You keep him as close as if he were a week’s old baby.”
Jeanne laughed again. “If you can keep a secret, Marc Lenoir, you may see my baby.”
“If it is a secret that has the boy in it, you may trust me.”
Jeanne gave an assenting nod which invited Marc to follow her indoors, and he saw, sitting demurely by the open fire, Alaine deftly sewing together bits of doeskin. She wore a little cap set upon her brown curls, and despite her furry jacket and leather leggings, there was such an unmistakable air of femininity in her attitude and employment that Marc at first stared, and then exclaimed, “A girl!”
“Surely. A young lady of good birth, Mademoiselle Hervieu, of Rouen, now in flight from a would-be lover, who more than once has carried her off, and from whom she has as often miraculously escaped. On this account she has disguised herself, for she wishes to elude discovery till she is safe at home again.”
Petit Marc stood abashed before the young lady, but Alaine smiled and dimpled. “You need not be afraid of me, Petit Marc,” she said. “I am as good a friend as when you taught me how to trap a beaver. Sit down and tell me about them all, Gros Edouard, Ricard of the big nose, and all the rest. I shall never forget how good you all were to me on that wild journey from Quebec.”
Petit Marc dropped his big hulk on a bench and sat looking at the fire; then he turned to Alaine with a dawning smile. “No wonder that General Jacques stood guard over you, and looked as if he would skin and devour us one after another if we so much as said ‘the devil!’ in your presence. He had a way, that General Jacques, and we all wondered afterwards why on that trip we kept our mouths so uncommonly sweet. Yet, mademoiselle, I think you must have heard some things you never heard before.”
Jeanne spoke up sharply. “You need not remind her of that, Petit Marc. It is I who now stand guard.”