e questions he had asked in his own
more interesting cogitations.

Without definite purpose, the patroon, who had listened with scant
attention to the poet, began to move slowly toward the actress, and at
that moment, the eyes of the soldier, turning to the saddling paddock,
where the horses were being led out, fell upon the figure drawing
near, recognizing in him the heir to the manor, Edward Mauville.
Construing in his approach a deliberate intention, a flush of quick
anger overspread Saint-Prosper's face and he glanced at the girl by
his side. But her manner assured him she had not observed the land
baron, for at that moment she was looking in the opposite direction,
endeavoring to discover Barnes or the others of the company in the
immense throng.

Murmuring some excuse to his unconscious companion and cutting short
the wiry old lady's reminiscences of the first public trotting race in
1818, the soldier left the box, and, moving with some difficulty
through the crowd, met Mauville in the aisle near the stairway. The
latter's face expressed surprise, not altogether of an agreeable
nature, at the encounter, but he immediately regained his composure.

"Ah, Monsieur Saint-Prosper," he observed easily, "I little thought to
see you here."

"Nor I you!" said the other bluntly.

The patroon gazed in seeming carelessness from the soldier to the
young girl. Saint-Prosper's presence in New Orleans could be accounted
for; he had followed her from the Shadengo Valley across the
continent; the drive begun at the country inn--he looking down from
the dormer window to witness the start--had been a long one; very
different from his own brief flight, with its wretched end. These
thoughts coursed rapidly through the land baron's brain; her
appearance rekindled the ashes of the past; the fire in his breast
flamed from his eyes, but otherwise he made no display of feeling. He
glanced out upon the many faces below them, bowing to one woman and
smiling at another.

"Oh, I couldn't stand a winter in the North," resumed the patroon,
turning once more to the soldier. "Although the barn-burners promised
to make it warm for me!"

Offering no reply to this sally, Saint-Prosper's gaze continued to
rest coldly and expectantly upon the other. Goaded by that arbitrary
regard, an implied barrier between him and the young girl, the land
baron sought to press forward; his glittering eyes met the other's;
the glances they exchanged were like