Placide seemed to have had a foreboding of ill from the start when he
found that Euphrasie began to interest herself in the condition of the
plantation. This ill feeling voiced itself partly when he told her
it was none of her lookout if the place went to the dogs. "It's good
enough for Joe Duplan to run things _en grand seigneur_, Euphrasie;
that's w'at's spoiled you."
Placide might have done much single-handed to keep the old place in
better trim, if he had wished. For there was no one more clever than he
to do a hand's turn at any and every thing. He could mend a saddle or
bridle while he stood whistling a tune. If a wagon required a brace or
a bolt, it was nothing for him to step into a shop and turn out one as
deftly as the most skilled blacksmith. Any one seeing him at work with
plane and rule and chisel would have declared him a born carpenter. And
as for mixing paints, and giving a fine and lasting coat to the side of
a house or barn, he had not his equal in the country.
This last talent he exercised little in his native parish. It was in a
neighboring one, where he spent the greater part of his time, that his
fame as a painter was established. There, in the village of Orville, he
owned a little shell of a house, and during odd times it was Placide's
great delight to tinker at this small home, inventing daily new
beauties and conveniences to add to it. Lately it had become a precious
possession to him, for in the spring he was to bring Euphrasie there as
his wife.
Maybe it was because of his talent, and his indifference in turning it
to good, that he was often called "a no-account creole" by thriftier
souls than himself. But no-account creole or not, painter, carpenter,
blacksmith, and whatever else he might be at times, he was a Santien
always, with the best blood in the country running in his veins. And
many thought his choice had fallen in very low places when he engaged
himself to marry little Euphrasie, the daughter of old Pierre Manton
and a problematic mother a good deal less than nobody.
Placide might have married almost any one, too; for it was the easiest
thing in the world for a girl to fall in love with him,--- sometimes
the hardest thing in the world not to, he was such a splendid fellow,
such a careless, happy, handsome fellow. And he did not seem to mind
in the least that young men who had grown up with him were lawyers
now, and planters, and members of Shakespeare clubs in town. No
one ever expected anything quite so humdrum as that of the Santien
boys. As youngsters, all three had been the despair of the country
school-master; then of the private tutor who had come to shackle them,
and had failed in his design. And the state of mutiny and revolt
that they had brought about at the college of Grand Coteau when their
father, in a moment of weak concession to prejudice, had sent them
there, is a thing yet remembered in Natchitoches.
And now Placide was going to marry Euphrasie. He could not recall the
time when he had not loved her. Somehow he felt that it began the
day when he was six years old, and Pierre, his father's overseer,
had called him from play to come and make her acquaintance. He was
permitted to hold her in his arms a moment, and it was with silent
awe that he did so. She was the first white-faced baby he remembered
having seen, and he straightway believed she had been sent to him as a
birthday gift to be his little play-mate and friend. If he loved her,
there was no great wonder; every one did, from the time she took her
first dainty step, which was a brave one, too.
She was the gentlest little lady ever born in old Natchitoches parish,
and the happiest and merriest. She never cried or whimpered for a
hurt. Placide never did, why should she? When she wept, it was when
she did what was wrong, or when he did; for that was to be a coward,
she felt. When she was ten, and her mother was dead, Mme. Duplan, the
Lady Bountiful of the parish, had driven across from her plantation,
Les Chêniers, to old Pierre's very door, and there had gathered up this
precious little maid, and carried her away, to do with as she would.
And she did with the child much as she herself had been done by.
Euphrasie went to the convent soon, and was taught all gentle things,
the pretty arts of manner and speech that the ladies of the "Sacred
Heart" can teach so well. When she quitted them, she left a trail of
love behind her; she always did.
Placide continued to see her at intervals, and to love her always.
One day he told her so; he could not help it. She stood under one of
the big oaks at Les Chêniers. It was midsummer time, and the tangled
sunbeams had enmeshed her in a golden fret-work. When he saw her
standing there in the sun's glamour, which was like a glory upon her,
he trembled. He seemed to see her for the first time. He could only
look at her, and wonder why her hair gleamed so, as it fell in those
thick chestnut waves about her ears and neck. He had looked a thousand
times into her eyes before; was it only to-day they held that sleepy,
wistful light in them that invites love? How had he not seen it before?
Why had he not known before that her lips were red, and cut in fine,
strong curves? that her flesh was like cream? How had he not seen that
she was beautiful? "Euphrasie," he said, taking her hands,--"Euphrasie,
I love you!"
She looked at him with a little astonishment. "Yes; I know, Placide."
She spoke with the soft intonation of the creole.
"No, you don't, Euphrasie. I did n' know myse'f how much tell jus' now."
Perhaps he did only what was natural when he asked her next if she
loved him. He still held her hands. She looked thoughtfully away,
unready to answer.
"Do you love anybody better?" he asked jealously. "Any one jus' as well
as me?" "You know I love papa better, Placide, an' Maman Duplan jus' as
well."
Yet she saw no reason why she should not be his wife when he asked her
to.
Only a few months before this, Euphrasie had returned to live with her
father. The step had cut her off from everything that girls of eighteen
call pleasure. If it cost her one regret, no one could have guessed it.
She went often to visit the Duplans, however; and Placide had gone to
bring her home from Les Chêniers the very day of Offdean's arrival at
the plantation.
They had traveled by rail to Natchitoches, where they found Pierre's
no-top buggy awaiting them, for there was a drive of five miles to be
made through the pine woods before the plantation was reached. When
they were at their journey's end, and had driven some distance; up
the long plantation road that led to the house in the rear, Euphrasie
exclaimed:--
"W'y, there's some one on the gall'ry with papa, Placide!"
"Yes; I see."
"It looks like some one f'om town. It mus' be Mr. Gus Adams; but I don'
see his horse."
"'T ain't no one f'om town that I know. It's boun' to be some one f'om
the city."
"Oh, Placide, I should n' wonder if Harding & Offdean have sent some
one to look after the place at las'," she exclaimed a little excitedly.
They were near enough to see that the stranger was a young man of very
pleasing appearance. Without apparent reason, a chilly depression took
hold of Placide.
"I tole you it was n' yo' lookout f'om the firs', Euphrasie," he said
to her.