"I do believe," began Jeanne when they had turned out of St Anne's street, "that Marie De Ber is going to be betrothed to that rough boat builder who walks beside her father."
"Antoine Beeson has a good record, and she will do well," returned Pani briefly.
"But I think it would not be easy to love him," protested Jeanne.
"Child, you are too young to talk about love. It is the parents who decide such matters."
"And I have none. You could not make me marry anyone, Pani. And I do not like these common men."
"I am not going to marry, you know. After all, maybe when I get old I will be a sister. It won't be hard to wear a black gown then. But I shall wait until I am _very_ old. Pani, did you ever dream of what might happen to you?"
"The good God sends what is best for us, child."
"But--Monsieur Bellestre might come. And if he took me away then Monsieur St. Armand might come. Pani, is Monsieur Bellestre as nice as Monsieur St. Armand? I cannot seem to remember him."
"Little maids should not be thinking of men so often. Think of thy prayers, Jeanne."
Sunday was a great time to walk on the parade ground, the young men attired in their best, the demoiselles gay as butterflies with a mother or married sister to guard them from too great familiarity. But there was much decorous coquetting on both sides, for even at that period many a young fellow was caught by a pair of smiling eyes.
Others went to walk in the woods outside the farms or sailing on the river, since there was no Puritan strictness. They did their duty by the morning mass and service, and the rest of the day was given over to simple pleasure. There was a kind of half religious hilarity in the very air.
And the autumn was so magnificently beautiful. The great hillsides with their tracts of timber that looked as if they fenced in the world when the sun dropped down behind them, but if one threaded one's way through the dark aisles and came out on the other side there were wonderful pictures,--small prairies or levels that suggested lakes and then a sort of avenue stretching out until another was visible, undulating surfaces, groves of pine, burr oak, and great stalwart hickories, then another woody ridge, and so on and on through interminable tangles and over rivers until Lake Michigan was reached. But not many of the habitans, or even the English, for that matter, had traveled to the other side of the state. The business journeys called them northward. There were Indian settlements about that were not over friendly.