"
"And I always shall be, my dear, so long as the daughter of a princess
and the great-granddaughter of a chef de bataillon allows me to mix
her dough!"
Melisse flung the red shawl over her head, still laughing.
"I will go and help her, Jean."
"Mon Dieu!" gasped Gravois, looking searchingly at Jan, when she had
left. "Shall I give you my best wishes, Jan Thoreau? Does it signify?"
"Signify--what?"
The little Frenchman's eyes snapped.
"Why, when our pretty Cree maiden becomes engaged, she puts up her
hair for the first time, that is all, my dear Jan. When I asked my
blessed Iowaka to be my wife, she answered by running away from me,
taunting me until I thought my heart had shriveled into a bit of salt
blubber; but she came back to me before I had completely died, with
her braids done up on the top of her head!"
He stopped suddenly, startled into silence by the strange look that
had come into the other's face. For a full minute Jan stood as if the
power of movement had gone from him. He was staring over the
Frenchman's head, a ghastly pallor growing in his cheeks.
"No--it--means--nothing," he said finally, speaking as if the words
were forced from him one by one.
He dropped into a chair beside the table like one whose senses had
been dulled by an unexpected blow.
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