A Little Girl in Old Detroit - Amanda Minnie Douglas (children's ebooks online txt) 📗

to float back. Only it was never quite the same--the shores, the woods, the birds, the squirrels, the deer that came and looked at her with unafraid eyes, impressed her with some new, inexplicable emotion. What meaning was behind them?

But to-night she could not go back. She had passed the unknown boundary. Her limited knowledge could not understand the unfolding, the budding of womanhood, whose next change was blossoming. It had been a day of varied emotions. If she could have run up the hillside with no curious eyes upon her, sung with the birds, gathered great handfuls of daisies and bell flowers, tumbled up the pink and yellow fungus that grew around the tree roots, studied the bits of crisp moss that stood up like sentinels, with their red caps, and if you trod on them bristled up again, or if she could have climbed the trees and swung from branch to branch in the wavering flecks of sunshine as she did only such a little while ago, all would have been well. What was it restrained her? Was it the throng of people? She had enjoyed startling them with a kind of bravado. That was childhood. Ah, yes. Everybody grew up, and these wild antics no longer pleased. Oh, could she not go back and have it all over again?

She had danced and laughed. Pierre had tried to keep her a good deal to himself, but she had been elusive as a golden mote dancing up and down. She seemed to understand what this sense of appropriating meant, and she did not like it.

And then Martin Lavosse had been curious as well. Rose and he were not betrothed, and Rose was like a gay humming bird, sipping pleasure and then away. Madame De Ber had certainly grown less strict. But Martin was still very young and poor, and Rose could do better with her pretty face. Like a shrewd, experienced person she offered no opposition that would be like a breeze to a smoldering flame. There was Edouard Loisel, the notary's nephew, and even if he was one of the best fiddlers in town, he had a head for business as well, and was a shrewd trader. M. Loisel had no children of his own and only these two nephews, and if Edouard fancied Rose before Martin was ready to speak--so the mother had a blind eye for Rose's pretty coquetries in that direction; but Rose did not like to have Martin quite so devoted to any other girl as he seemed to be to Jeanne.

Jeanne had not liked it at all. She had been good friends and comrades with the boys, but now they were grown and had curious ideas of holding one's hand and looking into one's eyes that intensified the new feeling penetrating every pulse. If only she might run away somewhere. If Pani were not so old they would go to the other side of the mountain and build a hut and live together there. She did not believe the Indians would molest them. Anything to get away from this strange burthen pressing down upon her that she knew not was womanhood, and be free once more.

She rose presently and went in. Pani was a heap in the chimney corner, she saw her by the long silver ray that fell across the floor.

"Pani! Pani!" she cried vehemently.

Her arms were around the neck and the face was lifted up, kissed with a fervor she had never experienced before.

"My little one! my little one!" sighed the woman.

"Come, let us go to bed." There was an eagerness in the tone that comforted the woman.

The next morning Detroit was at work betimes. There was no fashion of loitering then; when the sun flung out his golden arrows that dispelled the night, men and women were cheerfully astir.

"I must go and get some silk for Wenonah; she has some embroidery to finish for the wife of one of the officers," exclaimed Jeanne. "And then I will take it to her."

So if Pierre dropped in--

There were some stores down on St. Louis street where the imported goods from Montreal and Quebec were kept. Laces and finery for the quality, silks and brocades, hard as the times were. Jeanne tripped along gayly. She would be happy this morning anyhow, as if she was putting off some impending evil.

"Take care, child! Ah, it is Jeanne Angelot. Did I run over thee, or thou over me?" laughing. "I have not on my glasses, but I ought to see a tall slip of a girl like thee."

"Pardon, Monsieur. I was in haste and heedless."

"I have something for thee that will gladden thy heart--a letter. Let me see--" beginning to search his pockets, and then taking out a great leathern wallet. "No?" staring in surprise. "Then I must have left it on my desk at home. Canst thou spend time to run up and get it?"

"Oh, gladly." The words had a ring of joy that touched the man's heart.

"It is well, Mam'selle, that it comes from the father, since it is received with such delight."

She did not catch the double meaning. Indeed, Laurent was far from her thoughts.

"Thank you a thousand times," with her radiant smile, and he carried the bright face into his dingy warehouse.

She went on her way blithe as the gayest bird. A letter from M. St. Armand! It had been so long that sometimes she was afraid he might be dead, like M. Bellestre. The birds were singing. "A letter," they caroled; "a letter, a l-e-t-t-e-r," dwelling on every sound with enchanting tenderness.

The old Fleury house overlooked the military garden to the west, and the river to the east. There had been an addition built to it, a wing that placed the hall in the middle. It was wide, and the door at each end was set open. At the back were glimpses of all kinds of greenery and the fragrance of blossoming shrubs. A great enameled jar stood midway of the hall and had in it a tall blooming rose kept through the winter indoors, a Spanish rose growing wild in its own country. The floor was polished, the fur rugs had been stowed away, and the curious Indian grass mats exhaled a peculiar fragrance. A bird cage hung up high and its inmate was warbling an exquisite melody. Jeanne stood quite still and a sense of harmonious beauty penetrated her, gave her a vague impression of having sometime been part and parcel of it.

"What is it?" demanded the Indian servant. There were very few negroes in Detroit, and although there were no factories or mills, French girls seldom hired out for domestics.

"Madame Fleury--Monsieur sent me for a letter lying on his desk," Jeanne said in a half hesitating manner.

The servant stepped into the room to consult her mistress. Then she said to Jeanne:--

"Walk in here, Mademoiselle."

The room was much more richly appointed than the hall, though the polished floor was quite bare. A great high-backed settee with a carved top was covered with some flowered stuff in which golden threads shimmered; there was a tall escritoire going nearly up to the ceiling, the bottom with drawers that had curious brass handles, rings spouting out of a dragon's mouth. There were glass doors above and books and strange ornaments and minerals on the shelves. On the high mantel, and very few houses could boast them, stood brass candlesticks and vases of colored glass that had come from Venice. There were some quaint portraits, family heirlooms ranged round the wall, and chairs with carved legs and stuffed backs and seats.

On a worktable lay a book and a piece of lace work over a cushion full of pins. By it sat a young lady in musing mood.

She, too, said, "What is it?" but her voice had a soft, lingering cadence.

Jeanne explained meeting M. Fleury and his message, but her manner was shy and hesitating.

"Oh, then you are Jeanne Angelot, I suppose?" half assertion, half inquiry.

"Yes, Mademoiselle," and she folded her hands.

"I think I remember you as a little child. You lived with an Indian woman and were a"--no, she could not say "foundling" to this beautiful girl, who might have been born to the purple, so fine was her figure, her air, the very atmosphere surrounding her.

"I was given to her--Pani. My mother had died," she replied, simply.

"Yes--a letter. Let me see." She rose and went through a wide open doorway. Jeanne's eyes followed her. The walls seemed full of arms and hunting trophies and fishing tackle, and in the center of the room a sort of table with drawers down one side.

"Yes, here. 'Mademoiselle Jeanne Angelot.'" She seemed to study the writing. She was quite pretty, Jeanne thought, though rather pale, and her silken gown looped up at the side with a great bow of ribbon, fell at the back in a long train. Her movements were so soft and gliding that the girl was half enchanted.

"You still live with--with the woman?"

"M. Bellestre gave her the house. It is small, but big enough for us two. Yes, Mademoiselle. Thank you," as she placed the letter in Jeanne's hand, and received in return an enchanting smile. With a courtesy she left the room, and walked slowly down the path, trying to think. Some girl, for there was gossip even in those days, had said that Mam'selle's lover had proved false to her, and married some one else in one of the southern cities. Jeanne felt sorry for her.

Lisa Fleury wondered why so much beauty had been given to a girl who could make no use of it.

Jeanne hugged her letter to her heart. It had been so long, so long that she felt afraid she would never hear again. She wanted to run every step of the way, last summer she would have. She almost forgot Wenonah and the silk, then laughed at herself, and outside of the palisades she did run.

"You are so good," Wenonah said. "Look at this embroidery,--is it not grand? And that I used to color threads where now I can use beautiful silk. It shines like the sun. The white people have wonderful ways."

Jeanne laughed and opened her letter. She could wait no longer. Oh, delightful news! She laughed again in sheer delight, soft, rippling notes.

"What is it pleases thee so, Mam'selle?"

"It is my friend who comes back, the grand Monsieur with the beautiful white beard, for whose sake I learned to write. I am glad I have learned so many things. By another spring he will be here!"

Then Jeanne forgot the somber garment of womanhood that shadowed her last night, and danced in the very gladness of her heart. Wenonah smiled and then sighed. What if this man of so many years should want to marry the child? Such things had been. And there was that fine young De Ber just come home. But then, a year was a good while.

"I must go and tell Pani," and she was off like a bird.

Oh, what a glad day it was! The maypole and the dancing were as nothing to it. After she had told over her news and they had partaken of a simple meal, she dragged the Indian woman off to her favorite haunt in the woods, where three great tree boles made a pretty shelter and where Pani always fell asleep.

Bees were out buzzing, their curious accompaniment to their