Old Kaskaskia | Page 8

Maria's glance. It was an imperative gesture, meaning haste and secrecy,
and separation from her brother Rice. Maria laughed and shook her
head wistfully. The girlish pastimes of Midsummer Night were all done
for her. She thought of nights in her own wild county of Merionethshire,
when she had run, palpitating like a hare, to try some spell or charm
which might reveal the future to her; and now it was revealed.
An apparition from the other hemisphere came upon her that instant.
She saw a man standing by the friar's booth looking at her. What his
eyes said she could not, through her shimmering and deadly faintness,
perceive. How could he be here in Kaskaskia? The shock of seeing him
annihilated physical weakness in her. She stood on limbs of stone. Her
hand on her brother's arm did not tremble; but a pinched blueness
spread about her nostrils and eye sockets, and dinted sudden hollows in
her temples.
Dr. Dunlap took a step toward her. At that, she looked around for some
place to hide in, the animal instinct of flight arising first, and darted
from her brother into the graveyard. Rice beheld this freak with
quizzical surprise, but he had noted the disappearance of more than one
maid through that gate, and was glad to have Maria with them.
"Come on," whispered Peggy, seizing her. "Clarice Vigo has gone to
fetch Angélique, and then we shall be ready."
Behind the church, speaking all together like a chorus of blackbirds, the
girls were clustered, out of the bonfire's light. French and English
voices debated.

"Oh, I wouldn't do such a thing."
"Your mother did it when she was a girl."
"But the young men may find it out and follow."
"Then we'll run."
"I'm afraid to go so far in the dark."
"What, to the old Jesuit College?"
"It isn't very dark, and our old Dinah will go with us; she's waiting
outside the fence."
"But my father says none of our Indians are to be trusted in the dark."
"What a slander on our Indians!"
"But some of them are here; they always come to the St. John bonfire."
"All the men in Kaskaskia are here, too. We could easily give an
alarm."
"Anyhow, nothing will hurt us."
"What are you going to do, girls?" inquired the voice of Angélique
Saucier. The whole scheme took a foolish tinge as she spoke. They
were ashamed to tell her what they were going to do.
Peggy Morrison drew near and whispered, "We want to go to the old
Jesuit College and sow hempseed."
"Hempseed?"
"Yes. You do it on Midsummer Night."
"Will it grow the better for that?" asked the puzzled French girl.

"We don't want it to grow, you goose. We want to try our fortunes."
"It was Peggy Morrison's plan," spoke out Clarice Vigo.
"It's an old English custom," declared Peggy, "as old as burning
brushwood."
"Would you like to observe this old English custom, Mademoiselle
Zhone?" questioned Angélique.
"Yes, let us hurry on."
"I think myself it would be charming." The instant Angélique thought
this, Peggy Morrison's plan lost foolishness, and gained in all eyes the
dignity of adventure. "But we have no hempseed."
"Yes, we have," responded Peggy. "Our Dinah is there outside the
fence with her lap full of it."
"And how do you sow it?"
"You scatter it and say, 'Hempseed, I sow thee,--hempseed, I sow thee;
let him who is to marry me come after me and mow thee.'"
An abashed titter ran through girlish Kaskaskia.
"And what happens then?"
"Then you look back and see somebody following you with a scythe."
A suppressed squeal ran through girlish Kaskaskia.
"Now if we are going, we ought to go, or it will all be found out,"
observed Peggy with decision.
They had only to follow the nearest cross-street to reach the old Jesuit
College; but some were for making a long detour into the common
fields to avoid being seen, while others were for passing close by the
bonfire in a solid squad. Neither Peggy nor Angélique could reconcile

these factions, and Peggy finally crossed the fence and led the way in
silence. The majority hung back until they were almost belated. Then,
with a venturous rush, they scaled the fence and piled themselves upon
Dinah, who was quietly trying to deal out a handful of hempseed to
every passer; and some of them squalled in the fear of man at her
uplifted paw. Then, shying away from the light, they entered a street
which was like a canal of shadow. The houses bounding it were all dark,
except the steep roof slopes of the southern row, which seemed to
palpitate in the bonfire's flicker.
Finding themselves away from their families in this deserted lane, the
girls