“Well, dame,” replied Bigot, “you may retire to your own room. I will go down to the secret chamber myself. These vigils are killing her, poor girl! If your lady should be missing in the morning, remember, dame, that you make no remark of it; she is going away to-night with me and the Sieur Cadet and will return soon again; so be discreet and keep your tongue well between your teeth, which, I am glad to observe,” remarked he with a smile, “are still sound and white as ivory.”
Bigot wished by such flattery to secure her fidelity, and he fully succeeded. The compliment to her teeth was more agreeable than would have been a purse of money. It caught the dame with a hook there was no escape from.
Dame Tremblay courtesied very low, and smiled very broadly to show her really good teeth, of which she was extravagantly vain. She assured the Intendant of her perfect discretion and obedience to all his commands.
“Trust to me, your Excellency,” said she with a profound courtesy. “I never deceived a gentleman yet, except the Sieur Tremblay, and he, good man, was none! When I was the Charming Josephine, and all the gay gallants of the city used to flatter and spoil me, I never deceived one of them, never! I knew that all is vanity in this world, but my eyes and teeth were considered very fine in those days, your Excellency.”
“And are yet, dame. Zounds! Lake Beauport has had nothing to equal them since you retired from business as a beauty. But mind my orders, dame! keep quiet and you will please me. Good-night, dame!”
“Good-night, your Excellency! Good-night, your Honor!” replied she, flushed with gratified vanity. She left Bigot vowing to herself that he was the finest gentleman and the best judge of a woman in New France! The Sieur Cadet she could not like. He never looked pleasant on a woman, as a gentleman ought to do!
The dame left them to themselves, and went off trippingly in high spirits to her own chamber, where she instantly ran to the mirror to look at her teeth, and made faces in the glass like a foolish girl in her teens.
Bigot, out of a feeling of delicacy not usual with him, bid Cadet wait in the anteroom while he went forward to the secret chamber of Caroline. “The sudden presence of a stranger might alarm her,” he said.
He descended the stair and knocked softly at the door, calling in a low tone, “Caroline! Caroline!” No answer came. He wondered at that, for her quick ear used always to catch the first sound of his footsteps while yet afar off.
He knocked louder, and called again her name. Alas! he might have called forever! That voice would never make her heart flutter again or her eyes brighten at his footstep, that sounded sweeter than any music as she waited and watched for him, always ready to meet him at the door.