The city, bustling and animated by day, like an energetic housewife, was at night a gay demoiselle, awakening to new life and excitement. The clerk betook himself to his bowling or billiards and the mechanic to the circus, while beauty and fashion repaired to the concert room or to the OpÉra FranÇais, to listen to HalÉvy or Donizetti. Restless Americans or Irishmen rubbed elbows with the hurrying Frenchman or Spaniard, and the dignified creole gentleman of leisure alone was wrapped in a plenitude of dignity, computing probably the interest he drew on money loaned these assiduous foreigners.

Soldiers who had been granted leave of absence or had slipped the guard at the camp on Andrew Jackson’s battle-ground swaggered through the streets. The change from a diet of pork and beans and army hard tack was so marked that Uncle Sam’s young men threw restraint to the winds, took the mask balls by storm and gallantly assailed and made willing prisoners of the fair sex. Eager to exchange their 311 irksome life in camp for the active campaign in Mexico, it was small wonder they relieved their impatience by many a valiant dash into the hospitable town.

Carriages drove by with a rumble and a clatter, revealing a fleeting glimpse of some beauty with full, dark eye. Venders of flowers importuned the passers-by, doing a brisk business; the oyster and coffee stands reminded the spectator of a thoroughfare in London on a Saturday night, with the people congregating about the street stalls; but the brilliantly illumined places of amusement, with their careless patrons plainly apparent to all from without, resembled rather a boulevard scene in the metropolis of France. “Probably,” says a skeptical chronicler, “here and there are quiet drawing-rooms, and tranquil firesides, where domestic love is a chaste, presiding goddess.” But the writer merely presumes such might have been the case, and it is evident from his manner of expression, he offers the suggestion, or afterthought, charitably, with some doubts in his mind. Certainly he never personally encountered the chaste goddess of the hearth, or he would have qualified his words and made his statement more positive.

From the life of the streets, the land baron turned into a well-lighted entrance, passing into a large, luxuriously furnished saloon, at one end of which stood a table somewhat resembling a roulette board. Seated on one side was the phlegmatic cashier, and, opposite him, the dealer, equally impassive. Unlike faro––the popular New Orleans game––no deal box was 312 needed, the dealer holding the cards in his hand, while a cavity in the center of the table contained a basket, where the cards, once used, were thrown. A large chandelier cast a brilliant light upon the scene.

“Messieurs, faites vos jeux,” drawled the monotonous voice of the dealer, and expectation was keenly written on the faces of the double circle of players––variously disclosed, but, nevertheless, apparent in all; a transformation of the natural expression of the features; an obvious nervousness of manner, or where the countenance was impassive, controlled by a strong will, a peculiar glitter of the eyes, betokening the most insatiable species of the gambler. As the dealer began to shuffle together six packs of cards and place them in a row on the table, he called out:

“Nothing more goes, gentlemen!”

The rapidity with which the cashier counted the winnings at a distance and shoved them here and there with the long rake was amazing and bewildering to the novice risking a few gold pieces for the first time on the altar of chance. Sorting the gold pieces in even bunches, the cashier estimated them in a moment; shoved them together; counted an equal amount of fives with his fingers; made a little twirl in the pile on the table; pushed it toward the winning pieces and left them tumbled up together in pleasing confusion.

“Messieurs, faites vos––”

And the clinking went on, growing louder and louder, the clinking of gold, which has a particularly 313 musical sound, penetrating, crystalline as the golden bells of Exodus, tinkling in the twilight of the temple on the priest’s raiment. The clinking, clinking, that lingers in the brain long after, drawing the players to it night after night; an intoxicating murmur, singing the desires that dominate the world; the jingling that makes all men kin!

“Oh, dear!” said a light feminine voice, as the rapacious rake unceremoniously drew in a poor, diminutive pile of gold. “Why did I play? Isn’t it provoking?”

“You have my sympathy, Mistress Susan,” breathed a voice near her.

Looking around, she had the grace to blush becomingly, and approached Mauville with an expressive gesture, leaving Adonis and Kate at the table.

“Don’t be shocked, Mr. Mauville,” she began, hurriedly. “We were told it was among the sights, and, having natural curiosity––”

“I understand. Armed with righteousness, why should not one go anywhere?”

“Why, indeed?” she murmured.

“But I’m afraid I’m taking you from your play?”

“I’m not going to play any more to-night.”

“Tired, already?”

“No; but––but I haven’t a cent. That miserable table has robbed me of everything. All I have left”––piteously––“are the clothes on my back.”

“Something must have been the matter with your ‘system.’ But if a temporary loan––”

Susan was tempted, gazing longingly at the table, with the fever burning in her.

“No,” she said, finally. “I think I would win, but, of course, I might lose.”

“A wise reservation! Never place your fortune on the hazard of the die.”

“But I have! What’s the use of making good resolutions now? It’s like closing the barn-door after––”

“Just so!” he agreed. “But it might have been worse.”

“How?” In dismay. “Didn’t that stony-looking man rake in my last gold piece? He didn’t even look sorry, either. But what is the matter with your arm?” The land baron’s expression became ominous. “You shook hands with your left hand. Oh, I see; the duel!” Lightly.

“How did you hear about it?” asked Mauville, irritably.

“Oh, in a roundabout way. Murder will out! And Constance––she was so solicitous about Mr. Saint-Prosper, but rather proud, I believe, because he”––with a laugh––“came off victorious.”

Susan’s prattle, although accompanied by innocent glances from her blue eyes, was sometimes the most irritating thing in the world, and the land baron, goaded beyond endurance, now threw off his careless manner and swore in an undertone by “every devil in Satan’s calendar.”

“Can you not reserve your soliloquy until you leave me?” observed Susan, sweetly. “Otherwise––”

“I regret to have shocked your ladyship,” he murmured, satirically.

“I forgive you.” Raising her guileless eyes. “When I think of the provocation, I do not blame you––so much!”

“That is more than people do in your case,” muttered the land baron savagely.

Susan’s hand trembled. “What do you mean?” she asked, not without apprehension regarding his answer.

“Oh, that affair with the young officer––the lad who was killed in the duel, you know––”

Her composure forsook her for the moment and she bit her lip cruelly.

“Don’t!” she whispered. “I am not to blame. I never dreamed it would go so far! Why should people––”

“Why?” he interposed, ironically.

Susan pulled herself together. “Yes, why?” she repeated, defiantly. “Can women prevent men from making fools of themselves any more than they can prevent them from amusing themselves as they will? To-day it is this toy; to-morrow, another. At length”––bitterly––“a woman comes to consider herself only a toy.”

Her companion regarded her curiously. “Well, well!” he ejaculated, finally. “Losing at cards doesn’t agree with your temper.”

“Nor being worsted by Saint-Prosper with yours!” she retorted quickly.

Mauville looked virulent, but Susan, feeling that she had retaliated in ample measure, recovered her usual equanimity of temper and placed a conciliatory hand sympathetically on his arm.

“We have both had a good deal to try us, haven’t we? But how stupid men are!” she added suddenly. “As if you could not find other consolation!”

He directed toward her an inquiring glance.

“Some time ago, while I was acting in London,” resumed Susan, thoughtfully, “the leading lady refused to receive the attentions of a certain odious English lord. She was to make her appearance in a piece upon which her reputation was staked. Mark what happened! She was hissed! Hissed from the stage! My lord led this hostile demonstration and all his hired claqueurs joined in. She was ruined; ruined!” concluded Susan, smiling amiably.

“You are ingenious, Mistress Susan––not to say a trifle diabolical. Your plan––”

She opened her eyes widely. “I have suggested no plan,” she interrupted, hurriedly.

“Well, let us sit down and I will tell you about a French officer who––But here is a quiet corner, Mistress Susan, and if you will promise not to repeat it, I will regale you with a bit of interesting gossip.”

“I promise––they always do!” she laughed.

For such a frivolous lady, Susan was an excellent 317 listener. She, who on occasions chattered like a magpie, was now silent as a mouse, drinking in the other’s words with parted lips and sparkling eyes. First he showed her the letter FranÇois had brought him. Unmarked by postal indications, the missive had evidently been intrusted to a private messenger of the governor whose seal it bore. Dated about three years previously, it was written in a somewhat illegible, but not unintelligible, scrawl, the duke’s own handwriting.

“I send you, my dear marquis,” began the duke, “a copy of the secret report of the military tribunal appointed to investigate the charges against your kinsman, Lieut. Saint-Prosper, and regret the finding of the court should have been one of guilty of treason.

“Saint-Prosper and Abd-el-Kader met near the tomb of a marabout. From him the French officer received a famous ruby which he thrust beneath his zaboot––the first fee of their compact. That night when the town lay sleeping, a turbaned host, armed with yataghans, stole through the flowering cactuses. Sesame! The gate opened to them; they swarmed within! The soldiers, surprised, could render little resistance; the ruthless invaders cut them down while they were sleeping or before they could sound the alarm. The bravest blood of France flowed lavishly in the face of the treacherous onslaught; blood of men who had been his fastest friends, among whom he had been so popular for his dauntless courage and devil-may-care 318 temerity! But a period, fearfully brief, and the beloved tri-color was trampled in the dust; the barbarian flag of the Emir floated in its place.

“All these particulars, and the part Saint-Prosper played in the terrible drama, Abd-el-Kader, who is now our prisoner, has himself confessed. The necessity for secrecy, you, my dear Marquis, will appreciate. The publicity of the affair now would work incalculable injury to the nation. It is imperative to preserve the army from the taint of scandal. The nation hangs on a thread. God knows there is iniquity abroad. I, who have labored for the honor of France and planted her flag in distant lands, look for defeat, not through want of bravery, but from internal causes. A matter like this might lead to a popular uprising against the army. Therefore, the king wills it shall be buried by his faithful servants.”

As Mauville proceeded Susan remained motionless, her eyes growing larger and larger, until they shone like two lovely sapphires, but when he concluded she gave a little sigh of pleasure and leaned back with a pleased smile.

“Well?” he said, finally, after waiting some moments for her to speak.

“How piquantly wicked he is!” she exclaimed, softly.

“Piquantly, indeed!” repeated the land baron, dryly.

“And he carries it without a twinge! What a petrified conscience!”

“I believe you find him more interesting than ever?” said Mauville, impatiently.

“Possibly!” Languidly. “An exceptional moral ailment sometimes makes a man more attractive––like a––an interesting subject in a hospital, you know! But I have always felt,” she continued, with sudden seriousness, “there was something wrong with him. When I first saw him, I was sure he had had no ordinary past, but I did not dream it was quite so––what shall we call it––”

“Unsavory?” suggested her companion.

“That accounts for his unwillingness to talk about Africa,” went on Susan. “Soldiers, as a rule, you know, like to tell all about their sanguinary exploits. But the tented field was a forbidden topic with him. And once when I asked him about Algiers he was almost rudely evasive.”

“He probably lives in constant fear his secret will become known,” said Mauville, thoughtfully. “As a matter of fact, the law provides that no person is to be indicted for treason unless within three years after the offense. The tribunal did not return an indictment; the three years have just expired. Did he come to America to make sure of these three years?”

But Susan’s thoughts had flitted to another feature of the story.

“How strange my marquis should be connected with the case! What an old compliment-monger he was! He vowed he was deeply smitten with me.”

“And then went home and took to his bed!” added Mauville, grimly.

“You wretch!” said the young woman, playfully. “So that is the reason the dear old molly-coddle did not take me to any of the gay suppers he promised? Is it not strange Saint-Prosper has not met him?”

“You forget the marquis has been confined to his room since his brief, but disastrous, courtship of you. His infatuation seems to have brought him to the verge of dissolution.”

“Was it not worth the price?” she retorted, rising. “But I see my sister and Adonis are going, so I must be off, too. So glad to have met you!”

“You are no longer angry with me?”

“No; you are very nice,” she said. “And you have forgiven me?”

“Need you ask?” Pressing her hand. “Good evening, Mistress Susan!”

“Good evening. Oh, by the way, I have an appointment with Constance to rehearse a little scene together this evening. Would you mind loaning me that letter?”

“With pleasure; but remember your promise.”

“Promise?” repeated the young woman.

“Not to tell.”

“Oh, of course,” said Susan.

“But if you shouldn’t––”

“Then?”

“Then you might say the marquis, your friend and 321 admirer, gave you the letter. It would, perhaps, be easier for you to account for it than for me.”

“But if the marquis should learn––” began the other, half-dubiously.

“He is too ill for anything except the grave.”

“Oh, the poor old dear!”

She looked at the gaming table with its indefatigable players and then turned to Kate and Adonis who approached at that moment. “How did you come out, Adonis?”

“Out,” he said, curtly.

“Lucky in love, unlucky at”––began Kate.

“Then you must be very unlucky in love,” he retorted, “for you were a good winner at cards.”

“Oh, there are exceptions to that rule,” said Kate lazily, with a yawn. “I’m lucky at both––in New Orleans!”

“I have perceived it,” retorted Adonis, bitterly.

“Don’t quarrel,” Susan implored. Regarding the table once more, she sighed: “I’m so sorry I came!”

But her feet fairly danced as she flew towards the St. Charles. She entered, airy as a saucy craft, with “all sails in full chase, ribbons and gauzes streaming at the top,” and, with a frou-frou of skirts, burst into Constance’s room, brimful of news and importance. She remained there for some time, and when she left, it was noteworthy her spirits were still high. In crossing the hall, her red stockings became a fitting color accompaniment to her sprightly step, as she 322 moved over the heavy carpet, skirts raised coquettishly, humming with the gaiety of a young girl who has just left boarding school.

“A blooming, innocent creature!” growled an up-the-river planter, surveying her from one of the landings. “Lord love me, if she were only a quadroon, I’d buy her!”