sometimes are. Melicent could not reconcile his voice to her liking;
it was too softly low and feminine, and carried a note of pleading or
pathos, unless he argued with his horse, his dog, or a "nigger," at
which times, though not unduly raised, it acquired a biting quality
that served the purpose of relieving him from further form of
insistence.

He pulled rapidly and in silence down the bayou, that was now so
entirely sheltered from the open light of the sky by the meeting
branches above, as to seem a dim leafy tunnel fashioned by man's
ingenuity. There were no perceptible banks, for the water spread out
on either side of them, further than they could follow its flashings
through the rank underbrush. The dull plash of some object falling
into the water, or the wild call of a lonely bird were the only sounds
that broke upon the stillness, beside the monotonous dipping of the
oars and the occasional low undertones of their own voices. When
Gregoire called the girl's attention to an object near by, she fancied
it was the protruding stump of a decaying tree; but reaching for his
revolver and taking quiet aim, he drove a ball into the black upturned
nozzle that sent it below the surface with an angry splash.

"Will he follow us?" she asked, mildly agitated.

"Oh no; he's glad 'nough to git out o' the way. You betta put down yo'
veil," he added a moment later.

Before she could ask a reason--for it was not her fashion to obey at
word of command--the air was filled with the doleful hum of a gray
swarm of mosquitoes, which attacked them fiercely.

"You didn't tell me the bayou was the refuge of such savage
creatures," she said, fastening her veil closely about face and neck,
but not before she had felt the sharpness of their angry sting.

"I reckoned you'd 'a knowed all about it: seems like you know
everything." After a short interval he added, "you betta take yo' veil
off."

She was amused at Gregoire's authoritative tone and she said to him
laughing, yet obeying his suggestion, which carried a note of command:
"you shall tell me always, why I should do things."

"All right," he replied; "because they ain't any mo' mosquitoes;
because I want you to see somethin' worth seein' afta while; and
because I like to look at you," which he was doing, with the innocent
boldness of a forward child. "Ain't that 'nough reasons?"

"More than enough," she replied shortly.

The rank and clustering vegetation had become denser