“I assure you, Madame,” he replied with a weary shrug, “we French cannot afford to be sensitive on this account Even for us, the excesses of La Terreur—and most especially, the unfortunate enthusiasm for Docteur Guillotin’s ingenious device displayed by certain of our compatriotes—are a matter to be treated with scorn.” After favoring me with a thin smile, he turned his gaze upon the frontiersman. “So you are the famous Colonel Crockett, non?” he inquired, raising one eyebrow.

“Blamed if I ain’t. And who might you be?”

“Le Comte de Languedoc,” replied the other with a little bow. “At your service.”

“The Count,” Mrs. Nicodemus explained, “was an old acquaintance of my late husband’s. He is here to take a tour of our glorious Western prairies.”

“Don’t say?” Crockett remarked, scrutinizing the Frenchman through narrowed eyes. “Fixing on seeing the grandiferous sights of nature, eh?”

“Bien sûr,” replied the Count. “And, perhaps, to hunt some of your magnifique wild buffalo.”

This latter remark caused a broad, somewhat satirical, smile to spread across the frontiersman’s sunbrowned visage. “Buffalo?” he exclaimed. “Why, Count, hunting buffalo ain’t no sport for amateurs. When riled, them critters’ll turn as ugly as a copperhead in July. I once seen an ol’ bull go after a passel of redskins like a whole team of thunderbolts, even though the critter already had so many arrows stuck in him that he looked as thorny as a gol-danged honey locust tree.”

“I flatter myself, my cher Colonel, that I am not wholly unskilled in matters of the hunt,” replied the other. “Though I confess that, in the métier of savage pursuits, the American huntsman is, sans doute, unsurpassed in the world.” The subtly mocking tone in which this latter statement was expressed did not escape the notice even of the frontiersman, who—though normally oblivious of the nuances of irony—bristled visibly at the comment.

“I take it,” continued the Count, “that the weapon you have clutched so lovingly in your arms is your celebrated rifle, Old—how do you say?—Bitsy?”

“Betsy,” Crockett growled in reply. Then, gazing fondly at his rifle, he declared: “She’s my pride and joy, for a certainty.”

Taking one step forward, the Count extended his right hand in the direction of the weapon and inquired: “May I?”

After a brief moment of reluctant hesitation, Crockett surrendered the rifle to the Frenchman, who, after hefting it in both hands, raised the stock to his shoulder and peered down the length of the barrel, directing the muzzle towards the far end of the cavernous hallway, where a pair of French windows opened onto a lush, extensive garden.

“Go ahead and cock her, Count,” said Crockett. “She ain’t loaded.”

After making a thorough inspection of the piece—its shining lock and breech; its polished, silver-ornamented stock; and its singularly elongated barrel—the Frenchman observed: “Vraiment, it is an imposing—if, perhaps, somewhat cumbersome—firearm.”