“Hol’ on there, Buckskin—w’ere you takin’ us? W’y, I lef’ him at the sto’ mailin’ lettas.”
“Had the others all got back? Mrs. Laferm? Melicent? did they all stop at the store, too?”
“Who? Aunt Thrérèse? no, she was up at the house w’en I lef’—I reckon Miss Melicent was there too. Talkin’ ’bout fun,—it’s to git into one o’ them big spring wagons on a moonlight night, like they do in Centaville sometimes; jus’ packed down with young folks—and start out fur a dance up the coast. They ain’t nothin’ to beat it as fah as fun goes.”
“It must be just jolly. I guess you’re a pretty good dancer, Grégoire?”
“Well—’taint fur me to say. But they ain’t many can out dance me: not in Natchitoches pa’ish, anyway. I can say that much.”
If such a thing could have been, Fanny would have startled Grégoire more than once during the drive home. Before its close she had obtained a promise from him to take her up to Natchitoches for the very next entertainment,—averring that she didn’t care what David said. If he wanted to bury himself that was his own look out. And if Mrs. Laferm took people to be angels that they could live in a place like that, and give up everything and not have any kind of enjoyment out of life, why, she was mistaken and that’s all there was to it. To all of which freely expressed views Grégoire emphatically assented.
Hosmer had very soon disembarrassed himself of Torpedo, knowing that the animal would unerringly find his way to the corn crib by supper time. He continued his own way now untrammelled, and at an agreeable speed which soon brought him to the spring at the road side. Here he found Thérèse, half seated against a projection of rock, in her hand a bunch of ferns which she had evidently dismounted to gather, and holding Beauregard’s bridle while he munched at the cool wet tufts of grass that grew everywhere.
As Hosmer rode up at a rapid pace, he swung himself from his horse almost before the animal came to a full stop. He removed his hat, mopped his forehead, stamped about a little to relax his limbs and turned to answer the enquiry with which Thérèse met him.
“Left her at Morico’s. I’ll have to send the buggy back for her.”
“I can’t forgive myself for such a blunder,” said Thérèse regretfully, “indeed I had no idea of that miserable beast’s character. I never was on him you know—only the little darkies, and they never complained: they’d as well ride cows as not.”