But, though several servants had ventured in with frightened faces, none dared molest the giant. The master turned his entreating eyes upon his wife, but she seemed stunned, and only covered her face with her hands and sat as if paralyzed by a foreknowledge of what was coming.
Bras-Coupé lifted his great black palm and commenced:
"Mo cé voudrai que la maison ci là, et tout ça qui pas femme' ici, s'raient encore maudits! (May this house, and all in it who are not women, be accursed)."
The master fell back upon his pillow with a groan of helpless wrath.
The African pointed his finger through the open window.
"May its fields not know the plough nor nourish the herds that overrun it."
The domestics, who had thus far stood their ground, suddenly rushed from the room like stampeded cattle, and at that moment appeared Palmyre.
"Speak to him," faintly cried the panting invalid.
She went firmly up to her husband and lifted her hand. With an easy motion, but quick as lightning, as a lion sets foot on a dog, he caught her by the arm.
"Bras-Coupé oulé so' femme," he said, and just then Palmyre would have gone with him to the equator.