“How was that?” I asked listlessly.

“That fat little Baron, the Governor, was for deporting me for running past the sentry and giving him all the trouble I did.  It seems that the Vicomtesse promised to explain matters in a note which she wrote, and never did explain.  She was here with you, and a lot she cared about anything else.  Lucky that Monsieur de St. Gre came back.  Now his Excellency graciously allows me to stay here, if I behave myself, until I get married.”

I do not know how I spent the rest of the day.  It passed, somehow.  If I had had the strength then, I believe I should have fled.  I was to see her again, to feel her near me, to hear her voice.  During the weeks that had gone by I had schooled myself, in a sense, to the inevitable.  I had not let my mind dwell upon my visit to Les Iles, and now I was face to face with the struggle for which I felt I had not the strength.  I had fought one battle,—­I knew that a fiercer battle was to come.

In due time the doctor arrived, and while he prepared me for my departure, the little man sought, with misplaced kindness, to raise my spirits.  Was not Monsieur going to the country, to a paradise?  Monsieur—­so Dr. Perrin had noticed—­had a turn for philosophy.  Could two more able and brilliant conversationalists be found than Philippe de St. Gre and Madame la Vicomtesse?  And there was the happiness of that strange but lovable young man, Monsieur Temple, to contemplate.  He was in luck, ce beau garcon, for he was getting an angel for his wife.  Did Monsieur know that Mademoiselle Antoinette was an angel?

At last I was ready, arrayed in my best, on the gallery, when Monsieur de St. Gre came.  Andre and another servant carried me down into the court, and there stood a painted sedan-chair with the St. Gre arms on the panels.

“My father imported it, David,” said Monsieur de St. Gre.  “It has not been used for many years.  You are to be carried in it to the levee, and there I have a boat for you.”

Overwhelmed by this kindness, I could not find words to thank him as I got into the chair.  My legs were too long for it, I remember.  I had a quaint feeling of unreality as I sank back on the red satin cushions and was borne out of the gate between the lions.  Monsieur de St. Gre and Nick walked in front, the faithful Lindy followed, and people paused to stare at us as we passed.  We crossed the Place d’Armes, the Royal Road, gained the willow-bordered promenade on the levee’s crown, and a wide barge was waiting, manned by six negro oarsmen.  They lifted me into its stern under the awning, the barge was cast off, the oars dipped, and we were gliding silently past the line of keel boats on the swift current of the Mississippi.  The spars of the shipping were inky black, and the setting sun had struck a red band across the waters.  For a while the three of us sat gazing at the green shore, each wrapped in his own reflections,—­Philippe de St. Gre thinking, perchance, of the wayward son he had lost; Nick of the woman who awaited him; and I of one whom fate had set beyond me.  It was Monsieur de St. Gre who broke the silence at last.