He did not notice that she kept her hands under her chin as he drew her to him, that she did not, as had been her wont, put them on his shoulders. He did not feel her shrink, and no one, seeing, could have said that she shrank from him in ever so little.
“How beautiful you are!” he said, as he looked into her face.
“How glad I am to be here again, and how tired I am, Louis!” she said. “I’ve driven thirty miles since daylight.” She disengaged herself. “I am going to sleep now,” she added. “I am going to turn the key in my door till evening. Please tell Madame Marie so, Louis.”
Inside her room alone she flung herself on her bed in agony and despair.
“Louis—Oh, my God!” she cried, and sobbed and sobbed her strength away.
CHAPTER II. WHEN THE RED-COATS CAME
A month later there was a sale of the household effects, the horses and general possessions of Medallion the auctioneer, who, though a Protestant and an Englishman, had, by his wits and goodness of heart, endeared himself to the parish. Therefore the notables among the habitants had gathered in his empty house for a last drink of good-fellowship—Muroc the charcoalman, Duclosse the mealman, Benoit the ne’er-do-weel, Gingras the one-eyed shoemaker, and a few others. They had drunk the health of Medallion, they had drunk the health of the Cure, and now Duclosse the mealman raised his glass. “Here’s to—”
“Wait a minute, porridge-pot,” cried Muroc. “The best man here should raise the glass first and say the votre sante. ‘Tis M’sieu’ Medallion should speak and sip now.”
Medallion was half-sitting on the window-sill, abstractedly listening. He had been thinking that his ships were burned behind him, and that in middle-age he was starting out to make another camp for himself in the world, all because of the new Seigneur of Pontiac. Time was when he had been successful here, but Louis Racine had changed all that. His hand was against the English, and he had brought a French auctioneer to Pontiac. Medallion might have divided the parish as to patronage, but he had other views.