"'Ow'l you trade ?" he asked.
"My house for yours!" The old Colonel turned pale with anger.

He walked very quickly back, and came close up to his kinsman.
"Charlie!" he said.
"Injin Charlie,"-- with a tipsy nod.
But by this time self-control was returning.

"Sell Belles Demoiselles to you ?" he said in a high key, and then laughed "Ho, ho, ho!" and rode away.
A cloud, but not a dark one, overshadowed the spirits of Belles Demoiselles' plantation.

The old master, whose beaming presence had always made him a shining Saturn, spinning and sparkling within the bright circle of his daughters, fell into musing fits, started out of frowning reveries, walked often by himself, and heard business from his overseer fretfully.
No wonder.

The daughters knew his closeness in trade, and attributed to it his failure to negotiate for the Old Charlie buildings,--so to call them.