Bras-Coupe's intrepid audacity took the Spaniard's heart by irresistible assault.
"I leave it entirely with Senor Fusilier," he said.
"But he is not my master; he has no right--" "Silence!" And she was silent; and so, sometimes, is fire in the wall.
Agricola's consent was given with malicious promptness, and as Bras-Coupe's fetters fell off it was decreed that, should he fill his office efficiently, there should be a wedding on the rear veranda of the Grandissime mansion simultaneously with the one already appointed to take place in the grand hall of the same house six months from that present day.

In the meanwhile Palmyre should remain with Mademoiselle, who had promptly but quietly made up her mind that Palmyre should not be wed unless she wished to be.

Bras-Coupe made no objection, was royally worthless for a time, but learned fast, mastered the "gumbo" dialect in a few weeks, and in six months was the most valuable man ever bought for gourde dollars.

Nevertheless, there were but three persons within as many square miles who were not most vividly afraid of him.
The first was Palmyre.

His bearing in her presence was ever one of solemn, exalted respect, which, whether from pure magnanimity in himself, or by reason of her magnetic eye, was something worth being there to see.