le.
Plus tard, Mademoiselle; nous danserons plus tard."

"What devil inhabits you?" I said, when I had got him started on the way
to Madame Chouteau's.

"Your own, at present, Davy," he answered, laying a hand on my shoulder,
"else I should be on the way to the pon' with Lenoir. But the ball is to
come," and he executed several steps in anticipation. "Davy, I am sorry
for you."

"Why?" I demanded, though feeling a little self-commiseration also.

"You will never know how to enjoy yourself," said he, with conviction.

Madame Chouteau lived in a stone house, wide and low, surrounded by
trees and gardens. It was a pretty tribute of respect her children and
grandchildren paid her that day, in accordance with the old French usage
of honoring the parent. I should like to linger on the scene, and tell
how Nick made them all laugh over the story of Suzanne Lenoir and the
yellow birds, and how the children pressed around him and made him
imitate all the denizens of wood and field, amid deafening shrieks of
delight.

"You have probably delayed Gaspard's wooing another year, Mr. Temple.
Suzanne is a sad coquette," said Colonel Auguste Chouteau, laughing, as
we set out for the ball.

The sun was hanging low over the western hills as we approached the
barracks, and out of the open windows came the merry, mad sounds of
violin, guitar, and flageolet, the tinkle of a triangle now and then,
the shouts of laughter, the shuffle of many feet over the puncheons.
Within the door, smiling and benignant, unmindful of the stifling
atmosphere, sat the black-robed village priest talking volubly to an
elderly man in a scarlet cap, and several stout ladies ranged along the
wall: beyond them, on a platform, Zeron, the baker, fiddled as though
his life depended on it, the perspiration dripping from his brow,
frowning, gesticulating at them with the flageolet and the triangle. And
in a dim, noisy, heated whirl the whole village went round and round and
round under the low ceiling in the valse, young and old, rich and poor,
high and low, the sound of their laughter and the scraping of their feet
cut now and again by an agonized squeak from Zeron's fiddle. From time
to time a staggering, panting couple would fling themselves out, help
themselves liberally to pink sirop from the bowl on the side table,
and then fling themselves in once more, until Zeron stopped from sheer
exhaustion, to tune up for a pas de deux.

Across the room, by the sirop