"My mother was of the French noblesse," she said, a dark eye upon him to see how he would take this dignified piece of information. "She was a descendant of the Baron de Poutrincourt, who founded Port Royal."
David was as impressed as anyone could have desired. He did not know what the French noblesse was, but by its sound he judged it to be some high and honorable estate. He was equally ignorant of the identity of the Baron de Poutrincourt, but the name alone was impressive, especially as Miss Gillespie pronounced it.
"That's fine, isn't it?" he said, as being the only comment he could think of which at once showed admiration and concealed ignorance.
The young woman seemed to find it adequate and went on with her family history. Five years ago in Washington her father had seen his old friend, Marcus Whitman, and since then had been restless with the longing to move West. His health demanded the change. His labors as a physician had exhausted him. His daughter spoke feelingly of the impossibility of restraining his charitable zeal. He attended the poor for nothing. He rose at any hour and went forth in any weather in response to the call of suffering.
"That's what he says a doctor's duties are," she said. "It isn't a profession to make money with, it's a profession for helping people and curing them. You yourself don't count, it's only what you do that does. Why, my father had a very large practice, but he made only just enough to keep us."
Of all she had said this seemed to the listener the best worth hearing. The doctor now mounted to the top of the highest pedestal David's admiration could supply. Here was one of the compensations with which life keeps the balances even. Joe had died and left him friendless, and while the ache was still sharp, this stranger and his daughter had come to soothe his pain, perhaps, in the course of time, to conjure it quite away.
Early in the preceding winter the doctor had been forced to decide on the step he had been long contemplating. An attack of congestion of the lungs developed consumption in his weakened constitution. A warm climate and an open-air life were prescribed. And how better combine them than by emigrating to California?
"And so," said the doctor's daughter, "father made up his mind to go and sold out his practice. People thought he was crazy to start on such a trip when he was sick, but he knows more than they do. Besides, it's not going to be such hard work for him. Daddy John, the old man who drives the mules, knows all about this Western country. He was here a long time ago when Indiana and Illinois were wild and full of Indians. He got wounded out here fighting and thought he was going to die, and came back to New York. My father found him there, poor and lonely and sick, and took care of him and cured him. He's been with us ever since, more than twenty years, and he manages everything and takes care of everything. He and father'll tell you I rule them, but that's just teasing. It's really Daddy John who rules."
The mules were just behind them, and she looked back at the old man and called in her clear voice:
"I'm talking about you, Daddy John. I'm telling all about your wickedness."