“Va-t’en, mechant!” shrieked Suzanne, excitedly.

Poor Gaspard!  Poor Hippolyte!  They would gain Suzanne for a dance only to have her snatched away at the next by the slim and reckless young gentleman in the gray court clothes.  Little Nick cared that the affair soon became the amusement of the company.  From time to time, as he glided past with Suzanne on his shoulder, he nodded gayly to Colonel Chouteau or made a long face at me, and to save our souls we could not help laughing.

“The girl has met her match, for she has played shuttle-cock with all the hearts in the village,” said Monsieur Chouteau.  “But perhaps it is just as well that Mr. Temple is leaving to-night.  I have signed a bond, Mr. Ritchie, by which you can obtain money at New Orleans.  And do not forget to present our letter to Monsieur de Saint Gre.  He has a daughter, by the way, who will be more of a match for your friend’s fascinations than Suzanne.”

The evening faded into twilight, with no signs of weariness from the dancers.  And presently there stood beside us Jean Baptiste Lenoir, the Colonel’s miller.

“B’soir, Monsieur le Colonel,” he said, touching his skull-cap, “the water is very low.  You fren’,” he added, turning to me, “he stay long time in St. Louis?”

“He is going away to-night,—­in an hour or so,” I answered, with thanksgiving in my heart.

“I am sorry,” said Monsieur Lenoir, politely, but his looks belied his words.  “He is ver’ fond Suzanne.  Peut etre he marry her, but I think not.  I come away from France to escape the fine gentlemen; long time ago they want to run off with my wife.  She was like Suzanne.”

“How long ago did you come from France, Monsieur?” I asked, to get away from an uncomfortable subject.

“It is twenty years,” said he, dreamily, in French.  “I was born in the Quartier Saint Jean, on the harbor of the city of Marseilles near Notre Dame de la Nativite.”  And he told of a tall, uneven house of four stories, with a high pitched roof, and a little barred door and window at the bottom giving out upon the rough cobbles.  He spoke of the smell of the sea, of the rollicking sailors who surged through the narrow street to embark on his Majesty’s men-of-war, and of the King’s white soldiers in ranks of four going to foreign lands.  And how he had become a farmer, the tenant of a country family.  Excitement grew on him, and he mopped his brow with his blue rumal handkerchief.

“They desire all, the nobles,” he cried, “I make the land good, and they seize it.  I marry a pretty wife, and Monsieur le Comte he want her.  L’bon Dieu,” he added bitterly, relapsing into French.  “France is for the King and the nobility, Monsieur.  The poor have but little chance there.  In the country I have seen the peasants eat roots, and in the city the poor devour the refuse from the houses of the rich.  It was we who paid for their luxuries, and with mine own eyes I have seen their gilded coaches ride down weak men and women in the streets.  But it cannot last.  They will murder Louis and burn the great chateaux.  I, who speak to you, am of the people, Monsieur, I know it.”