"Well, not exactly."
"I say the trouble is not poverty, but abundance," responded Miss Gastonguay, warmly. "There are poor districts, I will not deny it, especially in back-woods localities or away from railroads, but I do not know that life. I have been brought up in towns. I wish I had not. If I had my life to live over, I would choose the cabin in the wilderness. Do you know who my most prized ancestor was?"
"No, I do not."
"Go look at him," and Miss Gastonguay waved her hand toward the opposite end of the apartment.
Derrice put her delicate Limoges cup on the table, and sauntered away. There was the explanation of Miss Gastonguay's mingled masculinity and femininity. From a massive gilt frame, a magnificent specimen of physical manhood, clad in full Indian costume, looked calmly down at the Louis Quinze furniture of the room.
"Kanawita, a great Tarratine chief," called Miss Gastonguay, "in copper breastplate and festoons of beads and wampum. In early days Louis Gastonguay built a truck-house here to trade with the Indians. His son fell in love with the daughter of Kanawita. Louis promptly shut him up in a block-house fort to cure him of his madness, but the lad was too clever for him, and ran away and got the girl, who was called Chelda. He married her, and then old Louis forgave and invited them here to the log-house that stood on the site of this château. A baby was born and named Louis for him, and I am the granddaughter of this second Louis, and my niece who lives with me is the child of my late brother, Charles Gastonguay,— but do not be afraid of me, my dear, for though I am half squaw and ought to spend a part of my time in the woods, I shall not scalp you unless you contradict me."
She had come to stand beside Derrice, and her face now glowed with humour and kindliness reflected from the benign, intelligent features of the aged chief above them.
"Oh, Kanawita," she continued, after the manner of an invocation, "benighted Indian, yet honest man, what deeds to make you blush have been perpetrated on this spot where you used to hunt the deer and angle for the wily fish! These Puritans,—" and she turned to Derrice,—"these sneaking, canting Puritans, ancestors of your husband, how I hate them. Their Bibles and psalm-books in one hand, their measuring tapes in the other. Singing, snivelling, cheating, and starting in horror from the French and English who drank, diced, swore, and were honest men and not hypocrites. Are you a Puritan, my dear?"
"Not that I know of. My father once said that we were of mixed French and American blood. We have no relatives—"
"French," said her companion, joyfully, and she acted as if she were about to embrace her, but was interrupted by Prosperity, who came trotting into the room.