“You are in a hurry for another master,” said Jean. “I am not tired of being my own master yet.”
“I wish you would make your people masters of themselves, Jean. They are not fit for power. Heaven take it from us, by putting all power into the hand of the king!”
“We meet by starlight,” said Jean. “I have the business of five thousand men to arrange first; so, more of the king another time.”
He leaped the nearest fence and was gone. Toussaint rose and walked away, with a countenance so serious, that Margot asked if there was bad news of Monsieur Bayou.
When the family understood that the Breda estate was to be attacked this night, there was no need to hasten their preparations for departure. In the midst of the hurry, Aimée consulted Isaac about an enterprise which had occurred to her, on her father’s behalf; and the result was, that they ventured up to the house, and as far as Monsieur Bayou’s book-shelves, to bring away the volumes they had been accustomed to see their father read. This thought entered Aimée’s mind when she saw him, busy as he was, carefully pocket the Epictetus he had been reading the night before. Monsieur Papalier was reading, while Thérèse was making packages of comforts for him. He observed the boy and girl, and when he found that the books they took were for their father, he muttered over the volume he held—
“Bayou was a fool to allow it. I always told him so. When our negroes get to read like so many gentlemen, no wonder the world is turned upside down.”
“Do your negroes read, Monsieur Papalier?” asked Isaac.
“No, indeed! not one of them.”
“Where are they all, then?”
Aimée put in her word.