He was hale and hearty and had not turned the half-century yet. Then he was full of plans. They would move the shop down on the Rue Royale and build a new room on to the old house. He had brought home some ideas of improvement and comfort, of larger living. It was not likely St. Louis would always stand still. Madame Marchand was delighted to get her friend back again. There was a new little girl, but Renée kept her beauty and winsomeness. Wawataysee was still lithe and slim—it belonged to her tribe—and M. Marchand was as devoted as ever. Oh, what days of talk it took to make up all the past! And Madame Gardepier had married and gone over to the Illinois side to live on a big plantation. Pierre Menard had a mill for sawing boards and a brewery for beer, no end of slaves and servants, full fifty years of age, and two grown sons married. He coveted the little Angelique Gardepier and sued hard for the mother, who would have a luxurious life. “But thou wilt be an American truly,” sighed Madame Renaud. There was still a great prejudice against the Illinois people. Their religion, or, rather, lack of religion, was a great stumbling-block. Then their roaming lives, their apparent disregard of home ties, that were so strong with the French. But monsieur adored her in a very complimentary fashion, and she was fain to satisfy her heart with it. Sometimes when the red-gold splendors were fading from the sky, leaving the bluffs and pearl-gray spaces on the opposite side like long avenues where the light shone through, Barbe Menard would glance over and wonder what particular merit there was in Renée de Longueville that the good God should have given so much to her. CHAPTER XXI FROM ACROSS THE SEA In the second year after Renée’s return two signal events happened. A new little boy was born. She had coveted a girl for Papa Gaspard to love as he had loved her, but one had to be content with what God sent, and the boy was bright and strong. “No,” Papa Gaspard said when they were talking it over one day, “there will be plenty of time for girls. I am not sorry. But I shall ask a gift of you and André, now that little Gaspard’s place is filled. Give him to me. Let him take my name. It would be a grief to me to have it die out. Let there be a new Gaspard Denys growing up into a brave boy, a good, upright man, we hope. You have your fortune and André will make another. There will be enough to keep a dozen children from starving,” with a bright, amused laugh. “I will make a new will and give the boy what I have left. The lead interest is increasing and will be a fortune by itself. So if you and André consent. It is not as if I wanted to take him away; it is simply that he shall be Gaspard Denys. In the old time they put a St. to it, but that was in France. We are going to be a new people.”