Part 6 (2/2)

”Did she change her mind, or did she misunderstand me?” he asked himself; and, in the hope that she might return for the basil, he put it in water in his back room.

The day being, as the figures have already shown, an unusually mild one, even for a Louisiana December, and the finger of the clock drawing by and by toward the last hour of sunlight, some half dozen of Frowenfeld's townsmen had gathered, inside and out, some standing, some sitting, about his front door, and all discussing the popular topics of the day.

For it might have been antic.i.p.ated that, in a city where so very little English was spoken and no newspaper published except that beneficiary of eighty subscribers, the ”Moniteur de la Louisiane,” the apothecary's shop in the rue Royale would be the rendezvous for a select company of English-speaking gentlemen, with a smart majority of physicians.

The Cession had become an accomplished fact. With due drum-beatings and act-reading, flag-raising, cannonading and galloping of aides-de-camp, Nouvelle Orleans had become New Orleans, and Louisiane was Louisiana.

This afternoon, the first week of American jurisdiction was only something over half gone, and the main topic of public debate was still the Cession. Was it genuine? and, if so, would it stand?

”Mark my words,” said one, ”the British flag will be floating over this town within ninety days!” and he went on whittling the back of his chair.

From this main question, the conversation branched out to the subject of land t.i.tles. Would that great majority of Spanish t.i.tles, derived from the concessions of post-commandants and others of minor authority, hold good?

”I suppose you know what ---- thinks about it?”

”No.”

”Well, he has quietly purchased the grant made by Carondelet to the Marquis of ----, thirty thousand acres, and now says the grant is two hundred _and_ thirty thousand. That is one style of men Governor Claiborne is going to have on his hands. The town will presently be as full of them as my pocket is of tobacco crumbs,--every one of them with a Spanish grant as long as Clark's ropewalk and made up since the rumor of the Cession.”

”I hear that some of Honore Grandissime's t.i.tles are likely to turn out bad,--some of the old Brahmin properties and some of the Mandarin lands.”

”Fudge!” said Dr. Keene.

There was also the subject of rotation in office. Would this provisional governor-general himself be able to stand fast? Had not a man better temporize a while, and see what Ex-Governor-general Casa Calvo and Trudeau were going to do? Would not men who sacrificed old prejudices, braved the popular contumely, and came forward and gave in their allegiance to the President's appointee, have to take the chances of losing their official positions at last? Men like Camille Brahmin, for instance, or Charlie Mandarin: suppose Spain or France should get the province back, then where would they be?

”One of the things I pity most in this vain world,” drawled Doctor Keene, ”is a hive of patriots who don't know where to swarm.”

The apothecary was drawn into the discussion--at least he thought he was. Inexperience is apt to think that Truth will be knocked down and murdered unless she comes to the rescue. Somehow, Frowenfeld's really excellent arguments seemed to give out more heat than light. They were merciless; their principles were not only lofty to dizziness, but precipitous, and their heights unoccupied, and--to the common sight--unattainable. In consequence, they provoked hostility and even resentment. With the kindest, the most honest, and even the most modest, intentions, he found himself--to his bewilderment and surprise--sniffed at by the ungenerous, frowned upon by the impatient, and smiled down by the good-natured in a manner that brought sudden blushes of exasperation to his face, and often made him ashamed to find himself going over these sham battles again in much savageness of spirit, when alone with his books; or, in moments of weakness, casting about for such unworthy weapons as irony and satire. In the present debate, he had just provoked a sneer that made his blood leap and his friends laugh, when Doctor Keene, suddenly rising and beckoning across the street, exclaimed:

”Oh! Agricole! Agricole! _venez ici_; we want you.”

A murmur of vexed protest arose from two or three.

”He's coming,” said the whittler, who had also beckoned.

”Good evening, Citizen Fusilier,” said Doctor Keene. ”Citizen Fusilier, allow me to present my friend, Professor Frowenfeld--yes, you are a professor--yes, you are. He is one of your sort, Citizen Fusilier, a man of thorough scientific education. I believe on my soul, sir, he knows nearly as much as you do!”

The person who confronted the apothecary was a large, heavily built, but well-molded and vigorous man, of whom one might say that he was adorned with old age. His brow was dark, and furrowed partly by time and partly by a persistent, ostentatious frown. His eyes were large, black and bold, and the gray locks above them curled short and harsh like the front of a bull. His nose was fine and strong, and if there was any deficiency in mouth or chin, it was hidden by a beard that swept down over his broad breast like the beard of a prophet. In his dress, which was noticeably soiled, the fas.h.i.+ons of three decades were hinted at; he seemed to have donned whatever he thought his friends would most have liked him to leave off.

”Professor,” said the old man, extending something like the paw of a lion, and giving Frowenfeld plenty of time to become thoroughly awed, ”this is a pleasure as magnificent as unexpected! A scientific man?--in Louisiana?” He looked around upon the doctors as upon a graduating cla.s.s.

”Professor, I am rejoiced!” He paused again, shaking the apothecary's hand with great ceremony. ”I do a.s.sure you, sir, I dislike to relinquish your grasp. Do me the honor to allow me to become your friend! I congratulate my downtrodden country on the acquisition of such a citizen! I hope, sir,--at least I might have hoped, had not Louisiana just pa.s.sed into the hands of the most clap-trap government in the universe, notwithstanding it pretends to be a republic,--I might have hoped that you had come among us to fasten the lie direct upon a late author, who writes of us that 'the air of this region is deadly to the Muses.'”

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