Whereupon she laughed that sad little laugh which I knew so well, and which seemed her manner of forcing mirth when Sir John was present. I took her out at her request. Sir John led Claudia; the others paired gravely, Hare walking with the Seneca and whispering in his ear. Candles seemed fewer than usual in the dining hall, but were sufficient to display the late Sir William's plate and glass. The scented wind from Claudia's fan stirred my hair, and I remembered it was still the hair of a forest runner, neither short nor sufficiently long for the queue, and powdered not a trace. I looked around at Claudia's bright face, more brilliant for the saucy patches and newly powdered hair. "La," said she, "you vie with Hiakatoo yonder in Mohawk finery, Jack,--all beads and thrums and wampum. And yet you have a pretty leg for a silken stocking, too." "In the Bush," said I, "the backwoods aristocracy make little of your silk hosen, Claudia. Our stockings are leather and our powder black, and our patches are of buckskin and are sewed on elbow and knee with pack-thread or sinew. Or we use them, too, for wadding." "It is a fashion like another," she remarked with a shrug, but watching me intently over her fan's painted edge. "The mode is a tyrant," said I, "and knows neither pity nor good taste." "How so?" "Why, Hiakatoo also wears paint, Claudia." "Meaning that I wear lip-rouge and lily-balm? Well, I do, my impertinent friend." "Who could suspect it?" I protested, mockingly. "You might have suspected it long since had you been sufficiently adventurous." "How so?" I inquired in my turn. "By kissing me, pardieu! But you always were a timid youth, Jack Drogue, and a woman's 'No,' with the proper stare of indignation, always was sufficient to route you utterly." In spite of myself I reddened under the smiling torment. "And if any man has had that much of you," said I, "then I for one will believe it only when I see your lip-rouge on his lips!" "Court me again and then look into your mirror," she retorted calmly. "What in the world are you saying to each other?" exclaimed Lady Johnson, tapping me with her fan. "Why, you are red as a squaw-berry, Jack, and your wine scarce tasted." Claudia said: "I but ask him to try his fortune, and he blushes like a silly." "Shame," returned Lady Johnson, laughing; "and you have Mr. Hare's scalp fresh at your belt!" Hare heard it, and laughed in his frank way, which instantly disarmed most people who had not too often heard it. "I admit," said he, "that I shall presently perish unless this cruel lady proves kinder, or restores to me my hair." "It were more merciful," quoth Ensign Moucher, "to slay outright with a single glance. I myself am long since doubly dead," he added with his mealy-mouthed laugh, and his mean reddish eyes a-flickering at Lady Johnson.