“I do not know which part you would like, Madame. Shall I tell you about Colonel Clark? I do not know when to begin—”
She dropped her sewing in her lap and looked up at me quickly.
“I told you that you were a strange man,” she said. “I almost lose patience with you. No, don't tell me about Colonel Clark—at least not until you come to him. Begin at the beginning, at the cabin in the mountains.”
“You want the whole of it!” I exclaimed.
She picked up her embroidery again and bent over it with a smile.
“Yes, I want the whole of it.”
So I began at the cabin in the mountains. I cannot say that I ever forgot she was listening, but I lost myself in the narrative. It presented to me, for the first time, many aspects that I had not thought of. For instance, that I should be here now in Louisiana telling it to one who had been the companion and friend of the Queen of France. Once in a while the Vicomtesse would look up at me swiftly, when I paused, and then go on with her work again. I told her of Temple Bow, and how I had run away; of Polly Ann and Tom, of the Wilderness Trail and how I shot Cutcheon, of the fight at Crab Orchard, of the life in Kentucky, of Clark and his campaign. Of my doings since; how I had found Nick and how he had come to New Orleans with me; of my life as a lawyer in Louisville, of the conventions I had been to. The morning wore on to midday, and I told her more than I believed it possible to tell any one. When at last I had finished a fear grew upon me that I had told her too much. Her fingers still stitched, her head was bent and I could not see her face,—only the knot of her hair coiled with an art that struck me suddenly. Then she spoke, and her voice was very low.
“I love Polly Ann,” she said; “I should like to know her.”
“I wish that you could know her,” I answered, quickening.
She raised her head, and looked at me with an expression that was not a smile. I could not say what it was, or what it meant.