"I?" said Jean, in quick surprise. It was strange she had said that! It was only that afternoon that Marie-Louise had said almost the same thing. Not like a fisherman! Why not? What was this imagined difference between himself and the other men in Bernay-sur-Mer?
"Yes; you," she returned briskly. "And now I suppose you will tell me that you were born here, and have lived here all your life?"
"But yes, mademoiselle," he smiled again, and shrugged his shoulders; "since it is so. I have never been anywhere else."
"And since it is so, it must be so," she nodded. "What is your name?"
"Jean Laparde," he replied.
"Jean"—she repeated the word deliberately. "I like Jean," she decided, nodding her head again. "I like Laparde, too, but I will call you Jean."
Jean's eyes met hers a little quizzically. She carried things by assault, this beautiful American girl! There was a certain element of intimacy, an air of proprietorship adopted toward him that somehow, at one and the same time, quickened his pulse at the vague promise that they would not be strangers if only she should stay in Bernay-sur-Mer, and piqued his man-mind at the hint of mastery being snatched from him.
"All call me Jean," he said quietly.
"Then that is settled!" she announced brightly. "Now tell me—Jean. Is there any other place in the village besides this impossible Taverne du Bas Rhône where we could stay for a week—a month—as long as we liked?"
"A week—a month!"—Jean leaned suddenly toward her, an incredulous delight unconsciously spontaneous in his voice. "You are going to stay that long? But Papa Fregeau said you had no sooner arrived than you decided to go again, and—"