"Safe as my honor!"
I know not with what emotions my captain had listened to this long recital. As for me, I had been intensely interested. Yet I could not tell why it should not please me to find that this scornful little lady was presumptive heiress to wealth and titles, probably even of royal rank, for so I could not but understand the doctor's illustration.
"Does Mademoiselle Pelagie know all this?" inquired the captain. "Does she know her rank and prospects? Is it permitted to speak of them to her?"
"Oh, no, no, no!" uttered the doctor, rapidly, with vigorous protestations of head and hands. "Pelagie knows nothing but that almost longer ago than she can remember she lived in a beautiful house with many servants, and with a father and mother who idolized her, but who went away from her one day never to return. Of course she knows now why they never returned, but that is all. She has lived with us in America nearly ten years, and I think she has learned to love Madame Saugrain and me almost as if we were indeed her father and mother, and we could not love child of our own more tenderly.
"And so you see, my dear young sir," regarding me with affectionate concern, "what a weighty responsibility I have put upon your young shoulders. If the burden is too great for you, I absolve you from your offer as escort, and Pelagie shall stay at home whether she will or not. I think it would be far the better way."
"Oh, no, no, sir!" I protested eagerly. "I am proud you think me worthy such a responsibility. I will never let her out of my sight for one moment, and I promise to bring her back to you in safety."
"Thank you," said the doctor, gravely; "that is what I would wish. Do not let her out of your sight if it is possible. Even if she seems to be fretted by your espionage I hope you will bear with her temper,—which I know to be a royal one,—and persist in your watchfulness. I shall be deeply grateful to you."
By the time the day of the picnic arrived, I flattered myself I had made some slight progress in Mademoiselle Pelagie's regard. Very slight, to be sure, yet I thought she did not treat me with quite the disdain she had shown at first. Indeed, I even thought I sometimes detected that she was listening with interest when Madame Saugrain or the good doctor was questioning me about my life at home in Philadelphia.
Twice a day at least we were brought together at the table, for the captain and I had taken up our abode at Dr. Saugrain's. It was not without much demur that we had, at last, accepted the doctor's urgent invitations to do so. To be sure, there was no hostelry in the village, except the low tavern where the disreputable Indians and rough river-men congregated, and we would have been obliged to accept some of the many hospitable invitations extended us by the Chouteaus, the Papins, the Cerrés, indeed by nearly every leading citizen of St. Louis, all eagerly vying with one another for the privilege of entertaining General Clarke's brother. I think the captain's hesitancy arose from the feeling that he ought to accept Émile Yosti's or Manuel Lisa's hospitality, since his business was chiefly concerned with them; but with me it was the feeling that it would be intolerable to dwell under the same roof with my Lady Disdain, and be subjected to countless little ignominies at her hands. Yet when the doctor presented it to us as a very great favor to him at this time, when he might need our assistance as well as our advice in protecting Mademoiselle Pelagie, we could object no further, and I, at least, was as eager to stay as I had before been unwilling. To me it seemed the more reasonable that he might easily need what assistance our swords could give him, if there were really on foot a plan to capture mademoiselle, because the doctor's house was set in a large garden, at the extreme borders of the village, next to the stockade and with no neighbor within hearing.
The day of the picnic rose clear and bright, changing soon to the purple haze and soft air of a day in late November. Breakfast was hardly over when the picnickers began to pass the house, some of them walking in merry groups, some in little French carts drawn by oxen or small, hardy ponies, but many of them, I noted with a beating heart, on horseback carrying double, the maiden on a pillion holding fast with her arm around her escort's waist. Was it thus my Lady Disdain expected to be carried to the picnic, I wondered, and could not tell for the life of me whether I most hoped it or dreaded it.