The Daredevil

by Maria Thompson Daviess

“And, mon enfant, is this the good Uncle to whose care you came into America?” asked that Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, as he reached out his imprisoned hands for a greeting to my relative.

I did not make any answer to that question. My head raised itself yet higher, and I looked my Gouverneur Faulkner again full in the face while I waited to hear what he would answer of my kinship to him.

“Sir, I am the friend of General Carruthers and I am also the Governor of the State of Harpeth. I have come across the mountains to talk with you about the business of this contract for mules for your army and I have brought your young friend to assist me if I should need translating from or to you. We Americans, Captain, are poor handlers of any language not our own, and the matter is of much gravity.” And as the Gouverneur Faulkner spoke those words to my Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, with a great courtesy but also a great sternness, in which he named me not as his friend but as the friend of that Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, I knew that I was placed by him among all women liars of the world and that to him his boy Robert of honor was of a truth dead forever.

“It is indeed of such a gravity that I have come from the English Canada to make all clear to myself,” answered my beloved Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, as he drew himself to his entire height, which was well-nigh as great as that of the Gouverneur of the State of Harpeth.

“And I have ridden a day and a night, sir, for the same purpose,” answered my great Gouverneur Faulkner with that beautiful courtesy of business I have always observed him to use in the transaction of his affairs in his office at the Capitol of the State of Harpeth. “And as one of us must make a beginning, will you not tell me, Captain, why you are here and in this predicament?”

“In a few words I will make all clear to you, Your Excellency,” made answer my Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, with an air of courtesy equal to that of the Gouverneur Faulkner. “I sent down into your State of Harpeth one of my Commission, to whom I gave the direction that with a lack of annoying publicity he should investigate the preparedness of the State of Harpeth to deliver those five thousand of mules to the Republique of France as was being proposed. Behold, a report that all is well comes to me, but—ah, it is with sorrow and shame that such a thing could be done by a son of poor France who struggles for life!—among the sheets of that report was left by mistake the fragments of a draft of a letter to an American woman, which made a partial disclosure of an intended falseness of that statement to me. Immediately I came alone to interview that false officer and I find him gone from that small town not far from here into your Capital. I was seeking to rapidly ride alone by directions into your Capital city to prevent that he make a signature, which I had given to him the authority to write, to those papers of so great an importance. I was thus arrested by that man of great wildness, whose patois I could not understand as he could not comprehend the English I make use of, and you see me thus. I beg of you to tell me if that wicked signature has been made.”

“The papers have not been signed, thank God, Captain, and your very impatient lieutenant is being shown some Southern hospitality by the flower and chivalry of Old Harpeth. And I beg your pardon for allowing you to be a prisoner a minute longer than necessary,” was the answer made to him by my Gouverneur Faulkner. “Untie the Captain, Jim; he’s all right. And you can bring us a little of your mountain dew while I clear this table here to use for the papers of our business.” And still my Gouverneur Faulkner did not speak or look at me and in my heart I then knew that he never would.

“I will make all ready,” I said as I lifted a large gun, a horn of a beast full of powder and several pipes with tobacco, from the table of rough boards that stood under the window for light.

“Ah, that is a good release! Thank you that you did not make tight enough for abrasions your cords, my good man,” said my Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, as he stretched out his arms and then bent to make a rubbing of his ankle upon which had been the chain.

“I said you warn’t no revenue. Here, drink, stranger!” answered the wild Jim as he handed a bottle of white liquid to my Capitaine, the Count de Lasselles, and also another to my Gouverneur Faulkner. “That boy can suck the drippings,” he added as he looked at me with humor.