“Speak.”
“I said so because nobody’s house is burnt, or even robbed; and nobody has been killed, or even hurt.”
“But, nevertheless, there is a great change. Our friends, my old friends, all whom I feel I could rely upon in case of need, are gone to France with Hédouville.”
“Oh, grandpapa! very few whites are gone—they were chiefly mulattoes who went with Hédouville; and so many whites remain! And though they are not, except, perhaps, Monsieur Critois, exactly our friends, yet we can easily make acquaintance with them.”
“No, no, child. If they were not upstarts, as some of them are, and others returned emigrants, of whom I know nothing, it is too late now for me to make now friends. My old companions are gone, and the place is a desert to me.”
His hands hung listlessly, as he rested on the arms of his chair. Euphrosyne looked up in his face, while she said, as well as she could for tears, “If you feel it so now, what will it be when I am shut up in the convent, and you will hardly ever see me?”
“That is no affair of yours, child. I choose that you should go.”
“Whose affair is it, if it is not mine? I am your grandchild—your only one; and it is my business, and the greatest pleasure I have in the world, to be with you, and wait upon you. If I leave you, I shall hear my poor mother reproaching me all day long. Every morning at my lessons, every night at my prayers, I shall hear her saying, ‘Where is your grandfather? How dare you desert him when he has only you left?’ Grandpapa, I shall be afraid to sleep alone. I shall learn to be afraid of my blessed mother.”
“It is time you were sent somewhere to learn your duty, I think. We are at a bad pass enough; but there must be some one in the colony who can tell you that it is your duty to obey your grandfather—that it is your duty to perform what you promised him.”
“I can preach that myself, grandpapa, when there is nobody else who can do it better. It is just what I have been teaching little Babet, this month past. I have no more to learn about that; but I will tell you what I do want to learn—whether you are most afraid of my growing up ignorant, or—(do just let me finish, and then we shall agree charmingly, I dare say)—whether you are most afraid of my growing up ignorant, or unsteady, or ill-mannered, or wicked, or what? As for being unsafe, I do not believe a word of that.”