“He was a favourite among you?”
“Ebberybody like ’im—black folks, white folks, all lub ’im. Missa ’Génie lub ’im. He live wi’ ole Mass’r Sançon all him life. I believe war one ob Missy ’Génie gardiums, or whatever you call ’em. Gorramighty! what will young Missa do now? She hab no friends leff; and daat ole fox Gayarre—he no good—”
Here the speaker suddenly interrupted himself, as if he feared that his tongue was going too freely.
The name he had pronounced and the expression by which it was qualified, at once awakened my curiosity—the name more than the qualification.
“If it be the same,” thought I, “Scipio has characterised him not otherwise than justly. Can it be the same?”
“You mean Monsieur Dominique Gayarre, the avocat?” I asked, after a pause.
Scipio’s great white eyeballs rolled about with an expression of mingled surprise and apprehension, and rather stammeringly he replied:—
“Daat am de genl’um’s name. Know ’im, young mass’r?”
“Only very slightly,” I answered, and this answer seemed to set my companion at his ease again.
The truth is, I had no personal acquaintance with the individual mentioned; but during my stay in New Orleans, accident had brought me in contact with the name. A little adventure had befallen me, in which the bearer of it figured—not to advantage. On the contrary, I had conceived a strong dislike for the man, who, as already stated, was a lawyer, or avocat of the New Orleans bar. Scipio’s man was no doubt the same. The name was too rare a one to be borne by two individuals; besides, I had heard that he was owner of a plantation somewhere up the coast—at Bringiers, I remembered. The probabilities were it was he. If so, and Mademoiselle Besançon had no other friend, then, indeed, had Scipio spoken truly when he said, “She hab no friends leff.”