Bayou Folk/A No-Account Creole/IX

Offdean rose early, wishing to take the morning train to the city. But he was not before Euphrasie, whom he found in the large hall arranging the breakfast table. Old Pierre was there too, walking slowly about with hands folded behind him, and with bowed head.

A restraint hung upon all of them, and the girl turned to her father and asked him if Placide were up, seemingly for want of something to say. The old man fell heavily into a chair, and gazed upon her in the deepest distress.

“Oh, my po’ li’le Euphrasie! my po’ li’le chile! Mr. Offde’n, you ain’t no stranger.”

“Bon Dieu! Papa!” cried the girl sharply, seized with a vague terror. She quitted her occupation at the table, and stood in nervous apprehension of what might follow.

“I yeared people say Placide was one no-‘count creole. I nevair want to believe dat, me. Now I know dat’s true. Mr. Offde’n, you ain’t no stranger, you.”

Offdean was gazing upon the old man in amazement.

“In de night,” Pierre continued, “I yaired some noise on de winder. I go open, an’ dere Placide, standin’ wid his big boot’ on, an’ his w’ip w’at he knocked wid on de winder, an’ his hoss all saddle’. Oh, my po’ li’le chile! He say, ‘Pierre, I yaired say Mr. Luke William’ want his house pent down in Orville. I reckon I go git de job befo’ somebody else teck it.’ I say, ‘You come straight back, Placide? He say, ‘Don’ look fer me.’ An’ w’en I ax ‘im w’at I goin’ tell to my li’le chile, he say, ‘Tell Euphrasie Placide know better ‘an anybody livin’ w’at goin’ make her happy.’ An’ he start ‘way; den he come back an’ say, ‘Tell dat man’ – I don’ know who he was talk’ ‘bout – ‘tell ‘im he ain’t goin’ learn nuttin’ to a creole.’ ''Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!'' I don’ know w’at all dat mean.”

He was holding the half-fainting Euphrasie in his arms, and stroking her hair.

“I always yaired say he was one no-‘count creole. I nevair want to believe dat.”

“Don’t – don’t say that again, papa,” she whisperingly entreated, speaking in French. “Placide has saved me!”

“He has save’ you f’om w’at, Euphrasie?” asked her father, in dazed astonishment.

“From sin,” she replied to him under her breath.

“I don’ know w’at all dat mean,” the old man muttered, bewildered, as he arose and walked out on the gallery.

Offdean had taken coffee in his room, and would not wait for breakfast. When he went to bid Euphrasie good-by, she sat beside the table with her head bowed upon her arm.

He took her hand and said good-by to her, but she did not look up.

“Euphrasie,” he asked eagerly, “I may come back? Say that I may – after a while.”

She gave him no answer, and he leaned down and pressed his cheek caressingly and entreatingly against her soft thick hair.

“May I, Euphrasie?” he begged. “So long as you do not tell me no, I shall come back, dearest one.”

She still made him no reply, but she did not tell him no.

So he kissed her hand and her cheek, - what he could touch of it, that peeped out from her folded arm, - and went away.

An hour later, when Offdean passed through Natchitoches, the old town was already ringing with the startling news that Placide had been dismissed by his fiancée, and the wedding was off, information which the young creole was taking the trouble to scatter broadcast as he went.