He looked so much in earnest while he told me all this, and so very good, that I was beginning to think he was not half so mischievous as Puck, when he gave a funny little chuckle, and rubbed his hands.
"Such fun as I have with the fishermen!" he cried. "If they forget to cross themselves with holy water before they go to sea, I fill their nets with heavy stones, or entice away the fish. When the fancy takes me, I change myself into the form of a handsome young man, and if folks do not then treat me with proper respect, and call me '_Bon Garçon_' civilly, I pelt them with stones until they run! Their wives and daughters are always gentle to poor _Nain Rouge_, however; and when I can, I do them a good turn. Shall I tell you how I consoled the fair Marguerite when she wept? Then listen well!"
"A favourite haunt of mine," began _Nain Rouge_, "is a little fishing village, close to Dieppe. The maidens there are more to my mind than those on any other part of the coast; their skin is like clear pale amber, warmed into redness where the sun has kissed it, and their eyes--ah! you should see them! The fairest of all was Marguerite, and often I sat for hours on her window-sill to watch her at her spinning. Etienne would come and watch her too, and he thought, foolish lad, that her angel-face meant an angel temper; but I knew she had a tongue.
And such a tongue! It was like the brook, for it never stopped, and she said such sharp and bitter things that the love of her friends withered up as they heard them, just as spring lilies droop before a cruel East wind. Etienne was a stranger, or he would have known better than to woo her seriously. Strange to relate, the wayward maid was different from the day he came. I had never known her so soft and sweet, and the neighbours said that surely some good fairy had laid her under a spell.
Etienne and she were wed one summer morning, but the little new moon had not shone in the heavens a second time when there was trouble between them. Marguerite's tongue was sharper than ever from its long rest, and Etienne could not believe it belonged to his 'angel' bride. He left the cottage without a word, and when he came back his mouth was grim, for his mates had hastened to make things worse by telling him many tales. A foolish man was Etienne, or he would not have heeded them; but that is neither here nor there.