Morning after morning the master looked out with apprehension toward the fields, until one night the worm came upon the indigo, and between sunset and sunrise every green leaf had been eaten up and there was nothing left for either insect or apprehension to feed upon.
And then he said--and the echo came back from the Cannes Brulees--that the very bottom culpability of this thing rested on the Grandissimes, and specifically on their fugleman Agricola, through his putting the hellish African upon him.

Moreover, fever and death, to a degree unknown before, fell upon his slaves.

Those to whom life was spared--but to whom strength did not return--wandered about the place like scarecrows, looking for shelter, and made the very air dismal with the reiteration, "_No' ouanga_ (we are bewitched), _Bras-Coupe fe moi des grigis_ (the voudou's spells are on me)." The ripple of song was hushed and the flowers fell upon the floor.
"I have heard an English maxim," wrote Colonel De Grapion to his kinsman, "which I would recommend you to put into practice--'Fight the devil with fire.'" No, he would not recognize devils as belligerents.
But if Rome commissioned exorcists, could not he employ one?
No, he would not! If his hounds could not catch Bras-Coupe, why, let him go.

The overseer tried the hounds once more and came home with the best one across his saddle-bow, an arrow run half through its side.
Once the blacks attempted by certain familiar rum-pourings and nocturnal charm-singing to lift the curse; but the moment the master heard the wild monotone of their infernal worship, he stopped it with a word.
Early in February came the spring, and with it some resurrection of hope and courage.

It may have been--it certainly was, in part--because young Honore Grandissime had returned.