on. "Davy, darlin'!" I heard him calling after me as I turned the
corner, but I looked not back.

There was a single sound in the street. A thin, bronzed Indian lad
squatted against the pickets with his fingers on a reed, his cheeks
distended. He broke off with a wild, mournful note to stare at me. A
wisp of smoke stole from a stone chimney, and the smell that corn-pone
and bacon leave was in the air. A bolt was slammed back, a door creaked
and stuck, was flung open, and with a "Va t'en, mechant!" a cotton-clad
urchin was cast out of the house, and fled into the dusty street.
Breathing the morning air in the doorway, stood a young woman in a cotton
gown, a saucepan in hand. She had inquisitive eyes, a pointed, prying
nose, and I knew her to be the village gossip, the wife of Jules,
Monsieur Vigo's clerk. She had the same smattering of English as her
husband. Now she stood regarding me narrowly between half-closed lids.

"A la bonne heure! Que fais-tu donc? What do you do so early?"

"The garrison is getting ready to leave for Kentucky to-day," I answered.

"Ha! Jules! Ecoute-toi! Nom de dieu! Is it true what you say?"

The visage of Jules, surmounted by a nightcap and heavy with sleep,
appeared behind her.

"Ha, e'est Daveed!" he said. "What news have you?"

I repeated, whereupon they both began to lament.

"And why is it?" persisted Jules.