The Daredevil | Page 4

small idol from the trenches in
the dead of one peaceful night to return with a very wide thick flannel
shirt of one of the Boches, which he had caught hanging upon a
temporary laundry line back of the German trenches.
At that English "daredevil" word I was in my mind again back in the
old Chateau de Grez and into my own childhood.
"You young daredevil, you, hold tight to that vine until I get a grip on
your wrist, or you'll dash us both on the rocks below," was the exact
sentence with which my father bestowed my title upon me as he hung
by his heels out of a window of the old vine-covered Chateau de Grez.
"It is one large mistake that my jeune fille is born what you call a boy
in heart. Helas!" sobbed my beautiful young French mother as she
regarded us from the garden below.
"If you were a boy I'd thrash you within an inch of your life, but as you
are a girl I suppose it is permissible for me to admire your pluck,
Mademoiselle Roberta," said my father as he landed me in the music
room by his side while an exchange of excited sentences went on
between my mother and old Nannette in the garden below. "What were
you doing out on that ledge, anyway? It is more than a hundred feet to
the ground and the rocks."
"I was making the hunt through Yellowstone Park that you have related
to me, father, and I prefer that you give me a boy's punishment. If I
have a boy's what you call 'pluck,' I should have a boy's what you call
'thrashing.' Monsieur, I make that demand. I am the Marquise de Grez
and Bye, and it may be that as you are an American you do not
understand fully the honor of the house of Grez." I can remember that
as I spoke I drew my ten-year old body up to its full height, which must
have been over that of twelve years, and looked my father straight in
the face with a glance of extreme hauteur as near as was possible to that

of the portrait of the old Marquis de Grez, who died fighting on the
field of Flanders.
"_Eh, la la_, what is it I have produced for you, Henri of America? It is
not a proper jeune fille, nor do I know what punishment to impose upon
her; but with you I must laugh," with which my beautiful mother from
the doorway threw herself into the arms of her young American
husband and her laughter of silver mingled with his deep laugh of a
great joy.
"Don't worry, Celeste; Bob is just a clear throw-back to her
great-grandmother, Nancy Donaldson, who shot two Indians and a bear
in defense of her kiddies one afternoon while my maternal grandsire
was in the stockades presiding over the council in which was laid down
the first broad draft for the formation of the Commonwealth of Harpeth.
I'm sorry, dear, that she is so vigorously American that she has to climb
the Rocky Mountains even here in the garden spot of France. Just now
she is French enough to be dealing with me in the terms of that jolly
old boy of Flanders fame in the hall downstairs; but cheer up,
sweetheart, she's a wild, daredevil American and I'm going to send her
back to the plains as soon as she speaks her native tongue with less
French accent. Then the rest of us can be happily French forever after."
"I will speak as you do, my father, from this moment forth," I answered
him with something that was wild and fierce and free rising in my
child's heart. "I will not be a grande dame of France. I am a woman of
America. I speak only United States." And I clung to my father's arm as
he drew me to him and embraced both my laughing mother and me,
before I was delivered to old Nannette who, with affectionate French
grumblings, led me away to the nursery for repairs.
The scene had become fixed in my memory, for from it had sprung a
friendship of a great closeness with my wonderful American father
whom love had chained in France. When he rode the great hunter that
had come across to him from a friend in Kentucky I demanded to cling
behind him or to sit the saddle in front of him, even at times running at
his side as long as my breath held out, to rise on his stirrup, like the
great terrifying Scotchmen do in battles, and cling as Kentuck made

flight over wall or fence. My very slim and strong hands could not be
kept from