“What, indeed?” echoes Jessie.
“A question, sister, you should be better able to answer than I. He is the trusted servant of M. Dupré; and he, I take it, has told you all about him.”
“Not a word has he. He knows that I don’t like the man, and never did from the first. I’ve intimated as much to him more than once.”
“That ought to have got Master Fernand his discharge. Your Luis will surely not keep him, if he knows it’s disagreeable to you?”
“Well, perhaps he wouldn’t if I were to put it in that way. I haven’t done so yet. I only hinted that the man wasn’t altogether to my liking; especially made so much of as Luis makes of him. You must know, dear Helen, my future lord and master is of a very trusting nature; far too much, I fear, for some of the people now around him. He has been brought up like all Creoles, without thought for the morrow. A sprinkling of Yankee cuteness wouldn’t do him any harm. As for this fellow, he has insinuated himself into Luis’s confidence in some way that appears quite mysterious. It even puzzles our father; though he’s said nothing much about it. So far he appears satisfied, because the man has proved capable, and, I believe, very useful to them in their affairs. For my part I’ve been mystified by him all along, and not less now. I wonder what he can be after. Can you not give a guess?”
“Not the slightest; unless it be theft. Do you think it’s that?”
“I declare I don’t know.”
“Is there anything he could be carrying off from the house, with the intention of secreting it outside? Some of your Luis’s gold for instance, or the pretty jewels he has given you?”
“My jewels! No; they are safe in their case; locked up in my room, of which I’ve the key with me. As for Luis’s gold, he hasn’t much of that. All the money he possesses—quite fifty thousand dollars, I believe—is in silver. I wondered at his bringing it out here in that heavy shape, for it made a whole waggon-load of itself. He’s told me the reason, however; which is, that among Indians and others out here on the frontier, gold is not thought so much of as silver.”
“It can’t be silver Fernand is stealing—if theft it be. He would look more loaded, and couldn’t have gone so lightly over that wall.”