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

and get the gold hidden under the sands--"

"But a serpent guards it."

"I am not afraid of a snake. I have killed more than one. And there are good spirits who will help you if you have the right charm."

"But you do not need to go. Some one will work for you. Some one will get the gold and treasure. If you will wait--"

"Well, I do not want the treasure. Pani and I have enough."

She tossed her head, still looking away.

"Do you know that I must go up to Micmac? I thought to stay all summer, but my father has sent."

"And men have to obey their fathers as girls do their mothers;" in an idly indifferent tone.

"It is best, Jeanne; I want to make a fortune."

"I hope you will;" but there was a curl to her lip.

"And I may come back next spring with the furs."

She nodded indifferently.

"My father has another secret, which may be worth a good deal."

She made no answer but beat up the water again. There was nothing but pleasure in her mind.

"Will you be glad to see me then? Will you miss me?"

"Why--of course. But I think I do not like you as well as I used," she cried frankly.

"Not like me as well?" He was amazed. "Why, Jeanne?"

"You have grown so--so--" neither her thoughts nor her vocabulary were very extensive. "I do not think I like men until they are quite old and have beautiful white beards and voices that are like the water when it flows softly. Or the boys who can run and climb trees with you and laugh over everything. Men want so much--what shall I say?" puzzled to express herself.

"Concession. Agreement," he subjoined; "that is right," with a decisive nod. "I hate it," with a vicious swish in the water.

"But when your way is wrong--"

"My way is for myself," with dignity.

"But if you have a lover, Jeanne?"

"I shall never have one. Madame Ganeau says so. I am going to keep a wild little girl with no one but Pani until--until I am a very old woman and get aches and pains and perhaps die of a fever."

She was in a very willful mood and she was only a child. One or two years would make a difference. If his father made a great fortune, and after all no one knew where she came from--he could marry in very good families, girls in plenty had smiled on him during the past two months.

Was it watching these lovers that had stirred his blood? Why should he care for this child?

"Had we not better turn about?" said Jacques Graumont, glancing around.

There were purple shadows on one side of the river and high up on the distant hills and a soft yellow pink sheen on the water instead of the blaze of gold. A clear, high atmosphere that outlined everything on the Canadian shore as if it half derided its proud neighbor's jubilee.

Other boats were returning. Songs that were so gay an hour ago took on a certain pensiveness, akin to the purple and dun stealing over the river. It moved Jeanne Angelot strangely; it gave her a sense of exaltation, as if she could fly like a bird to some strange country where a mother loved her and was waiting for her.

When Louis Marsac spoke next to her she could have struck him in childish wrath. She wanted no one but the fragrant loneliness and the voices of nature.

"Don't talk to me!" she cried impatiently. "I want to think. I like what is in my own mind better."

Then the anger went slowly out of her face and it settled in lovely lines. Her mouth was a scarlet blossom, and her hair clung mistlike about brow and throat, softened by the warmth.

They came grating against the dock after having waited for their turn. Marsac caught her arm and let the others go before her, and she, still in a half dream, waited. Then he put his arm about her, turned her one side, and pressed a long, hot kiss on her lips. His breath was still tainted with the brandy he had been drinking earlier in the day.

She was utterly amazed at the first moment. Then she doubled up her small hand and struck the mouth that had so profaned her.

"Hah! knave," cried a voice beside her. "Let the child alone! And answer to me. What business had you with this canoe? Child, where are your friends?"

"My business with it was that I hired and paid for it," cried Marsac, angrily, and the next instant he felt for his knife.

"Paid for it?" repeated the other. "Then come and convict a man of falsehood. Put up your knife. Let us have fair play. I had hired the canoe in the morning and went up the river, and was to have it this afternoon, and he declared you took it without leave or license."

"That is a lie!" declared Marsac, passionately.

"Jeanne! Jeanne!" cried Pani in distress.

The stranger lifted her out. Jeanne looked back at Marsac, and then at the young man.

"You will not fight him?" she said to the stranger. Fights and brawls were no uncommon events.

"We shall have nothing to fight about if the man has lied to us both. But I wouldn't care to be in _his_ skin. Come along, my man."

"I am not your man," said Marsac, furiously angry.

"Well--stranger, then. One can hardly say friend," in a dignified fashion that checked Marsac.

Pani caught the child. Pierre was on the other side of her. "What was it?" he asked. How good his stolid, rugged face looked!

"A quarrel about the boat. Run and see how they settle it, Pierre."

"But you and Marie--and it is getting dark."

"Run, run! We are not afraid." She stamped her foot and Pierre obeyed.

Marie clung to her. People jostled them, but they made their way through the narrow, crowded street. The bells were ringing, more from long habit now. Soldiers in uniform were everywhere, some as guards, caring for the noisier ones. Madame De Ber was leaning over her half door, and gave a cry of joy.

"Where hast thou been all day, and where is Pierre, my son?" she demanded.

The three tried to explain at once. They had had a lovely day, and Madame Ganeau, with her daughter and promised son-in-law, were along in the sail down the river. And Pierre had gone to see the result of a dispute--

"I sent him," cried Jeanne, frankly. "Oh, here he comes," as Pierre ran up breathless.

"O my son, thou art safe--"

"It was no quarrel of mine," said Pierre, "and if it had been I have two good fists and a foot that can kick. It was that Jogue who hired his boat twice over and pretended to forget. But he gave back the money. He had told a lie, however, for he said Marsac took the canoe without his knowledge, and then he declared he had been so mixed up--I think he was half drunk--that he could not remember. They were going to hand him over to the guard, but he begged so piteously they let him off. Then he and Louis Marsac took another drink."

Jeanne suddenly snatched up her skirt and scrubbed her mouth vigorously.

"It has been a tiresome day," exclaimed Pani, "and thou must have a mouthful of supper, little one, and go to bed."

She put her arm over the child's shoulder, with a caress; and Jeanne pressed her rosy cheek on the hand.

"I do not want any supper but I will go to bed at once," she replied in a weary tone.

"It is said that at the eastward in the Colonies they keep just such a July day with flags and confusion and cannon firing and bells ringing. One such day in a lifetime is enough for me," declared Madame De Ber.

They kept the Fourth of July ever afterward, but this was really their national birthday.

Jeanne scrubbed her mouth again before she said her little prayer and in five minutes she was soundly asleep. But the man who had kissed her and who had been her childhood's friend staggered homeward after a roistering evening, never losing sight of the blow she had struck him.

"The tiger cat!" he said with what force he could summon. "She shall pay for this, if it is ten years! In three or four years I will marry her and then I will train her to know who is master. She shall get down on her knees to me if she is handsome as a princess, if she were a queen's daughter."

Laurent St. Armand went home to his father a good deal amused after all his disappointment and vexation, for he had been compelled to take an inferior canoe.

"_Mon pere_," he said, as his father sat contentedly smoking, stretched out in a most comfortable fashion, "I have seen your little gossip of the morning, and I came near being in a quarrel with a son of the trader De Marsac, but we settled it amicably and I should have had a much better opinion of him, if he had not stopped to drink Jogue's vile brandy. He's a handsome fellow, too."

"And is the little girl his sister?"

"O no, not in anyway related." Then Laurent told the story, guessing at the kiss from the blow that had followed.

"Good, I like that," declared St. Armand. "Whose child is it?"

"That I do not know, but she lives up near the Citadel and her name is Jeanne Angelot. Shall I find her for you to-morrow?"

"She is a brave little girl."

"I do not like Marsac."

"His mother was an Indian, the daughter of some chief, I believe. De Marsac is a shrewd fellow. He has great faith in the copper mines. Strange how much wealth lies hidden in the earth! But the quarrel?" with a gesture of interest.

"Oh, it was nothing serious and came about Jogue's lying. I rated him well for it, but he had been drinking and there was not much satisfaction. Well, it has been a grand day and now we shall see who next rules the key to the Northwest. There is great agitation about the Mississippi river and the gulf at the South. It is a daring country, _mon pere_."

The elder laughed with a softened approval.

Louis Marsac did not come near St. Joseph street the next day. He slept till noon, when he woke with a humiliating sense of having quite lost his balance, for he seldom gave way to excesses. It was late in the afternoon when he visited the old haunts and threw himself under Jeanne's oak. Was she very angry? Pouf! a child's anger. What a sweet mouth she had! And she was none the worse for her spirit. But she was a tempestuous little thing when you ran counter to her ideas, or whims, rather.

Since she had neither birth nor wealth, and was a mere child, there would be no lovers for several years, he could rest content with that assurance. And if he wanted her then--he gave an indifferent nod.

Down at the Merchants' wharf, the following morning, he found the boats were to sail at once. He