“Voila, so sad, so wonderful! She keeps the ring—dear P’tite Louison!” said Florian, the eldest.
“Alors, she gives him a legacy in her will! Sweet P’tite Louison,” said Octave.
“Mais, the governor and the archbishop admire her—P’tite Louison:” said Felix, nodding confidently at Medallion.
“Bien, you should see the linen and the petticoats!” said Isidore, the humorous one of the family. “He was great—she was an angel, P’tite Louison!”
“Attends! what love—what history—what passion!—the perfect P’tite Louison!” cried Emile, the youngest, the most sentimental. “Ah, Moliere!” he added, as if calling on the master to rise and sing the glories of this daughter of romance.
Isidore’s tale was after this fashion:
“I ver’ well remember the first of it; and the last of it—who can tell? He was an actor—oh, so droll, that! Tall, ver’ smart, and he play in theatre at Montreal. It is in the winter. P’tite Louison visit Montreal. She walk past the theatre and, as she go by, she slip on the snow and fall. Out from a door with a jomp come M’sieu’ Hadrian, and pick her up. And when he see the purty face of P’tite Louison, his eyes go all fire, and he clasp her hand to his breast.
“‘Ma’m’selle, Ma’m’selle,’ he say, ‘we must meet again!’
“She thank him and hurry away queeck. Next day we are on the river, and P’tite Louison try to do the Dance of the Blue Fox on the ice. While she do it, some one come up swift, and catch her hand and say: ‘Ma’m’selle, let’s do it together’—like that! It take her breath away. It is M’sieu’ Hadrian. He not seem like the other men she know; but he have a sharp look, he is smooth in the face, and he smile kind like a woman. P’tite Louison, she give him her hand, and they run away, and every one stop to look. It is a gran’ sight. M’sieu’ Hadrian laugh, and his teeth shine, and the ladies say things of him, and he tell P’tite Louison that she look ver’ fine, and walk like a queen. I am there that day, and I see all, and I think it dam good. I say: ‘That P’tite Louison, she beat them all’—I am only twelve year old then. When M’sieu’ Hadrian leave, he give her two seats for the theatre, and we go. Bagosh! that is grand thing that play, and M’sieu’ Hadrian, he is a prince; and when he say to his minister, ‘But no, my lord, I will marry out of my star, and where my heart go, not as the State wills,’ he look down at P’tite Louison, and she go all red, and some of the women look at her, and there is a whisper all roun’.
“Nex’ day he come to the house where we stay, but the Cure come also pretty soon and tell her she must go home—he say an actor is not good company. Never mind. And so we come out home. Well, what you think? Nex’ day M’sieu’ Hadrian come, too, and we have dam good time—Florian, Octave, Felix, Emile, they all sit and say bully-good to him all the time. Holy, what fine stories he tell! And he talk about P’tite Louison, and his eyes get wet, and Emile he say his prayers to him—bagosh! yes, I think. Well, at last, what you guess? M’sieu’ he come and come, and at last one day, he say that he leave Montreal and go to New York, where he get a good place in a big theatre—his time in Montreal is finish. So he speak to Florian and say he want marry P’tite Louison, and he say, of course, that he is not marry and he have money. But he is a Protestan’, and the Cure at first ver’ mad, bagosh!