XII

"THE POINT ENVENOMED TOO!"

I was roused by the opening of the door. Doltaire entered. He

advanced towards me with the manner of an admired comrade, and,

with no trace of what would mark him as my foe, said, as he

sniffed the air:

"Monsieur, I have been selfish. I asked myself to breakfast with

you, yet, while I love the new experience, I will deny myself in

this. You shall breakfast with me, as you pass to your new lodgings.

You must not say no," he added, as though we were in some salon. "I

have a sleigh here at the door, and a fellow has already gone to fan

my kitchen fires and forage for the table. Come," he went on, "let

me help you with your cloak."

He threw my cloak around me, and turned towards the door. I had not

spoken a word, for what with weakness, the announcement that I was

to have new lodgings, and the sudden change in my affairs, I was

like a child walking in its sleep. I could do no more than bow to

him and force a smile, which must have told more than aught else of

my state, for he stepped to my side and offered me his arm. I drew

back from that with thanks, for I felt a quick hatred of myself that

I should take favours of the man who had moved for my destruction,

and to steal from me my promised wife. Yet it was my duty to live if

I could, to escape if that were possible, to use every means to foil

my enemies. It was all a game; why should I not accept advances at

my enemy's hands, and match dissimulation with dissimulation?

When I refused his arm, he smiled comically, and raised his

shoulders in deprecation.

"You forget your dignity, monsieur," I said presently as we

walked on, Gabord meeting us and lighting us through the passages;

"you voted me a villain, a spy, at my trial!"

"Technically and publicly, you are a spy, a vulgar criminal," he

replied; "privately, you are a foolish, blundering gentleman."

"A soldier, also, you will admit, who keeps his compact with his

enemy."

"Otherwise we should not breakfast together this morning," he

answered. "What difference would it make to this government if our

private matter had been dragged in? Technically, you still would

have been the spy. But I will say this, monsieur, to me you are a

man better worth torture than death."

"Do you ever stop to think of how this may end for you?" I asked

quietly.

He seemed pleased with the question. "I have thought it might be

interesting," he answered; "else, as I said, you should long ago

have left this naughty world. Is it in your mind that we shall

cross swords one day?"

"I feel it in my bones," said I, "that I shall kill you."

At that moment we stood at the entrance to the citadel, where a

good pair of horses and a sleigh awaited us. We got in, the robes

were piled around us, and the horses started off at a long trot. I

was muffled to the ears, but I could see how white and beautiful was

the world, how the frost glistened in the trees, how the balsams

were weighted down with snow, and how snug the chateaux looked with

the smoke curling up from their hunched chimneys.

Presently Doltaire replied to my last remark. "Conviction is the

executioner of the stupid," said he. "When a man is not great

enough to let change and chance guide him, he gets convictions,

and dies a fool."

"Conviction has made men and nations strong," I rejoined.

"Has made men and nations asses," he retorted. "The Mohammmedan

has conviction, so has the Christian: they die fighting each other,

and the philosopher sits by and laughs. Expediency, monsieur,

expediency is the real wisdom, the true master of this world.

Expediency saved your life to-day; conviction would have sent you

to a starry home."

As he spoke a thought came in on me. Here we were in the open

world, travelling together, without a guard of any kind. Was it not

possible to make a dash for freedom? The idea was put away from me,

and yet it was a fresh accent of Doltaire's character that he

tempted me in this way. As if he divined what I thought, he said

to me--for I made no attempt to answer his question:

"Men of sense never confuse issues or choose the wrong time for

their purposes. Foes may have unwritten truces."

There was the matter in a nutshell. He had done nothing carelessly;

he was touching off our conflict with flashes of genius. He was the

man who had roused in me last night the fiercest passions of my

life, and yet this morning he had saved me from death, and, though

he was still my sworn enemy, I was about to breakfast with him.

Already the streets of the town were filling; for it was the day

before Christmas, and it would be the great market-day of the year.

Few noticed us as we sped along down Palace Street and I could not

conceive whither we were going, until, passing the Hotel Dieu, I

saw in front the Intendance. I remembered the last time I was there,

and what had happened then, and a thought flashed through me that

perhaps this was another trap. But I put it from me, and soon

afterwards Doltaire said:

"I have now a slice of the Intendance for my own, and we shall

breakfast like squirrels in a loft."

As we drove into the open space before the palace, a company of

soldiers standing before the great door began marching up to the

road by which we came. With them was a prisoner. I saw at once that

he was a British officer, but I did not recognize his face. I asked

his name of Doltaire, and found it was one Lieutenant Stevens, of

Rogers' Rangers, those brave New Englanders. After an interview

with Bigot he was being taken to the common jail. To my request

that I might speak with him Doltaire assented, and at a sign from

my companion the soldiers stopped. Stevens's eyes were fixed on me

with a puzzled, disturbed expression. He was well built, of intrepid

bearing, with a fine openness of manner joined to handsome features.

But there was a recklessness in his eye which seemed to me to come

nearer the swashbuckling character of a young French seigneur than

the wariness of a British soldier.

I spoke his name and introduced myself. His surprise and pleasure

were pronounced, for he had thought (as he said) that by this time

I would be dead. There was an instant's flash of his eye, as if a

suspicion of my loyalty had crossed his mind; but it was gone on

the instant, and immediately Doltaire, who also had interpreted the

look, smiled, and said he had carried me off to breakfast while the

furniture of my former prison was being shifted to my new one. After

a word or two more, with Stevens's assurance that the British had

recovered from Braddock's defeat and would soon be knocking at the

portals of the Chateau St. Louis, we parted, and soon Doltaire and

I got out at the high stone steps of the palace.

Standing there a moment, I looked round. In this space

surrounding the Intendance was gathered the history of New France.

This palace, large enough for the king of a European country with

a population of a million, was the official residence of the

commercial ruler of a province. It was the house of the miller, and

across the way was the King's storehouse, La Friponne, where poor

folk were ground between the stones. The great square was already

filling with people who had come to trade. Here were barrels of

malt being unloaded; there, great sacks of grain, bags of dried

fruits, bales of home-made cloth, and loads of fine-sawn boards and

timber. Moving about among the peasants were the regular soldiers

in their white uniforms faced with blue, red, yellow, or violet,

with black three-cornered hats, and black gaiters from foot to

knee, and the militia in coats of white with black facings. Behind

a great collar of dogskin a pair of jet-black eyes flashed out from

under a pretty forehead; and presently one saw these same eyes

grown sorrowful or dull under heavy knotted brows, which told of a

life too vexed by care and labour to keep alive a spark of youth's

romance. Now the bell in the tower above us rang a short peal, the

signal for the opening of La Friponne, and the bustling crowd moved

towards its doors. As I stood there on the great steps, I chanced

to look along the plain, bare front of the palace to an annex at

the end, and standing in a doorway opening on a pair of steps was

Voban. I was amazed that he should be there--the man whose life

had been spoiled by Bigot. At the same moment Doltaire motioned to

him to return inside; which he did.

Doltaire laughed at my surprise, and as he showed me inside

the palace said: "There is no barber in the world like Voban.

Interesting interesting! I love to watch his eye when he draws the

razor down my throat. It would be so easy to fetch it across; but

Voban, as you see, is not a man of absolute conviction. It will be

sport, some day, to put Bigot's valet to bed with a broken leg or

a fit of spleen, and send Voban to shave him."

"Where is Mathilde?" I asked, as though I knew naught of her

whereabouts.

"Mathilde is where none may touch her, monsieur; under the

protection of the daintiest lady of New France. It is her whim; and

when a lady is charming, an Intendant, even, must not trouble her

caprice."

He did not need to speak more plainly. It was he who had prevented

Bigot from taking Mathilde away from Alixe, and locking her up, or

worse. I said nothing, however, and soon we were in a large room,

sumptuously furnished, looking out on the great square. The morning

sun stared in, some snowbirds twittered on the window-sill, and

inside, a canary, in an alcove hung with plants and flowers, sang as

if it were the heart of summer. All was warm and comfortable, and it

was like a dream that I had just come from the dismal chance of a

miserable death. My cloak and cap and leggings had been taken from

me when I entered, as courteously as though I had been King Louis

himself, and a great chair was drawn solicitously to the fire. All

this was done by the servant, after one quick look from Doltaire.

The man seemed to understand his master perfectly, to read one look

as though it were a volume--

"The constant service of the antique world."

Such was Doltaire's influence. The closer you came to him, the

more compelling was he--a devilish attraction, notably selfish, yet

capable of benevolence. Two years before this time I saw him lift

a load from the back of a peasant woman and carry it home for her,

putting into her hand a gold piece on leaving. At another time, an

old man had died of a foul disease in a miserable upper room of a

warehouse. Doltaire was passing at the moment when the body should

be carried to burial. The stricken widow of the dead man stood

below, waiting, but no one would fetch the body down. Doltaire

stopped and questioned her kindly, and in another minute he was

driving the carter and another upstairs at the point of his sword.

Together they brought the body down, and Doltaire followed it to

the burying-ground; keeping the gravedigger at his task when he

would have run away, and saying the responses to the priest in the

short service read above the grave.

I said to him then, "You rail at the world and scoff at men and

many decencies, and yet you do these things!"

To this he replied--he was in my own lodgings at the time--"The

brain may call all men liars and fools, but the senses feel the

shock of misery which we do not ourselves inflict. Inflicting,

we are prone to cruelty, as you have seen a schoolmaster begin

punishment with tears, grow angry at the shrinking back under his

cane, and give way to a sudden lust of torture. I have little pity

for those who can help themselves--let them fight or eat the leek;

but the child and the helpless and the sick it is a pleasure to

aid. I love the poor as much as I love anything. I could live their

life, if I were put to it. As a gentleman, I hate squalor and the

puddles of wretchedness but I could have worked at the plough or

the anvil; I could have dug in the earth till my knuckles grew big

and my shoulders hardened to a roundness, have eaten my beans and

pork and pea-soup, and have been a healthy ox, munching the bread

of industry and trailing the puissant pike, a diligent serf. I have

no ethics, and yet I am on the side of the just when they do not

put thorns in my bed to keep me awake at night!"

Upon the walls hung suits of armour, swords of beautiful make,

spears, belts of wonderful workmanship, a tattered banner, sashes

knit by ladies' fingers, pouches, bandoleers, and many strong

sketches of scenes that I knew well. Now and then a woman's head in

oils or pencil peeped out from the abundant ornaments. I recalled

then another thing he said at that time of which I write:

"I have never juggled with my conscience--never 'made believe'

with it. My will was always stronger than my wish for anything,

always stronger than temptation. I have chosen this way or that

deliberately. I am ever ready to face consequences, and never to

cry out. It is the ass who does not deserve either reward or

punishment who says that something carried him away, and, being

weak, he fell. That is a poor man who is no stronger than his

passions. I can understand the devil fighting God, and taking the

long punishment without repentance, like a powerful prince as he

was. I could understand a peasant, killing King Louis in the

palace, and being ready, if he had a hundred lives, to give them

all, having done the deed he set out to do. If a man must have

convictions of that sort, he can escape everlasting laughter--the

final hell--only by facing the rebound of his wild deeds."

These were strange sentiments in the mouth of a man who was ever

the mannered courtier, and as I sat there alone, while he was gone

elsewhere for some minutes, many such things he had said came back

to me, suggested, no doubt, by this new, inexplicable attitude

towards myself. I could trace some of his sentiments, perhaps

vaguely, to the fact that--as I had come to know through the

Seigneur Duvarney--his mother was of peasant blood, the beautiful

daughter of a farmer of Poictiers, who had died soon after giving

birth to Doltaire. His peculiar nature had shown itself in his

refusal to accept a title. It was his whim to be the plain

"Monsieur"; behind which was, perhaps, some native arrogancy which

made him prefer that to being a noble whose origin, well known,

must ever interfere with his ambitions. Then, too, maybe, the

peasant in him--never in his face or form, which were patrician

altogether--spoke for more truth and manliness than he was capable

of, and so he chose to be the cynical, irresponsible courtier, while

many of his instincts had urged him to the peasant's integrity. He

had undisturbed, however, one instinct of the peasant--a directness,

which was evident chiefly in the clearness of his thoughts.

As these things hurried through my mind, my body sunk in a kind

of restfulness before the great fire, Doltaire came back.

"I will not keep you from breakfast," said he. "Voban must wait,

if you will pass by untidiness."

A thought flashed through my mind. Maybe Voban had some word for

me from Alixe! So I said instantly, "I am not hungry. Perhaps you

will let me wait yonder while Voban tends you. As you said, it

should be interesting."

"You will not mind the disorder of my dressing-room? Well, then,

this way, and we can talk while Voban plays with temptation."

So saying, he courteously led the way into another chamber,

where Voban stood waiting. I spoke to him, and he bowed, but did

not speak; and then Doltaire said:

"You see, Voban, your labour on Monsieur was wasted so far as

concerns the world to come. You trimmed him for the glorious company

of the apostles, and see, he breakfasts with Monsieur Doltaire--in

the Intendance, too, my Voban, which, as you know, is wicked--a very

nest of wasps!"

I never saw more hate than shot out of Voban's eyes at that

moment; but the lids drooped over them at once, and he made ready

for his work, as Doltaire, putting aside his coat, seated himself,

laughing. There was no little daring, as there was cruelty, in thus

torturing a man whose life had been broken by Doltaire's associate.

I wondered now and then if Doltaire were not really putting acid on

the barber's bare nerves for some other purpose than mere general

cruelty. Even as he would have understood the peasant's murder of

King Louis, so he would have seen a logical end to a terrible game

in Bigot's death at the hand of Voban. Possibly he wondered that

Voban did not strike, and he himself took a delight in showing him

his own wrongs occasionally. Then, again, Doltaire might wish for

Bigot's death, to succeed him in his place! But this I put by as

improbable, for the Intendant's post was not his ambition, or,

favourite of La Pompadour as he was, he would, desiring, have

long ago achieved that end. Moreover, every evidence showed that

he would gladly return to France, for his clear brain foresaw the

final ruin of the colony and the triumph of the British. He had

once said in my hearing:

"Those swaggering Englishmen will keep coming on. They are too

stupid to turn back. The eternal sameness of it all will so

distress us we shall awake one morning, find them at our bedsides,

give a kick, and die from sheer ennui. They'll use our banners to

boil their fat puddings in, they'll roast oxen in the highways,

and after our girls have married them they'll turn them into

kitchen wenches with frowsy skirts and ankles like beeves!"

But, indeed, beneath his dangerous irony there was a strain of

impishness, and he would, if need be, laugh at his own troubles,

and torture himself as he had tortured others. This morning he

was full of a carbolic humour. As the razor came to his neck he

said:

"Voban, a barber must have patience. It is a sad thing to

mistake friend for enemy. What is a friend? Is it one who says

sweet words?"

There was a pause, in which the shaving went on, and then he

continued:

"Is it he who says, I have eaten Voban's bread, and Voban shall

therefore go to prison, or be hurried to Walhalla? Or is it he who

stays the iron hand, who puts nettles in Voban's cold, cold bed,

that he may rise early and go forth among the heroes?"

I do not think Voban understood that, through some freak of purpose,

Doltaire was telling him thus obliquely he had saved him from

Bigot's cruelty, from prison or death. Once or twice he glanced at

me, but not meaningly, for Doltaire was seated opposite a mirror,

and could see each motion made by either of us. Presently Doltaire

said to me idly:

"I dine to-day at the Seigneur Duvarney's. You will be glad to

hear that mademoiselle bids fair to rival the charming Madame

Cournal. Her followers are as many, so they say, and all in one

short year she has suddenly thrown out a thousand new faculties and

charms. Doubtless you remember she was gifted, but who would have

thought she could have blossomed so! She was all light and softness

and air; she is now all fire and skill as well. Matchless!

matchless! Every day sees her with some new capacity, some fresh

and delicate aplomb. She has set the town admiring, and jealous

mothers prophesy trist ending for her. Her swift mastery of the

social arts is weird, they say. La! la! The social arts! A good

brain, a gift of penetration, a manner--which is a grand necessity,

and it must be with birth--no heart to speak of, and the rest is

easy. No heart--there is the thing; with a good brain and senses all

warm with life--to feel, but never to have the arrow strike home.

You must never think to love and be loved, and be wise too. The

emotions blind the judgment. Be heartless, be perfect with heavenly

artifice, and, if you are a woman, have no vitriol on your

tongue--and you may rule at Versailles or Quebec. But with this

difference: in Quebec you may be virtuous; at Versailles you must

not. It is a pity that you may not meet Mademoiselle Duvarney. She

would astound you. She was a simple ballad a year ago; to-morrow she

may be an epic."

He nodded at me reflectively, and went on:

"'Mademoiselle,' said the Chevalier de la Darante to her at

dinner, some weeks ago, 'if I were young, I should adore you.'

'Monsieur,' she answered, 'you use that "if" to shirk the

responsibility.' That put him on his mettle. 'Then, by the gods,

I adore you now,' he answered. 'If I were young, I should blush

to hear you say so,' was her reply. 'I empty out my heart, and

away trips the disdainful nymph with a laugh,' he rejoined gaily,

the rusty old courtier; 'there's nothing left but to fall upon

my sword!' 'Disdainful nymphs are the better scabbards for

distinguished swords,' she said, with charming courtesy. Then,

laughing softly, 'There is an Egyptian proverb which runs thus:

"If thou, Dol, son of Hoshti, hast emptied out thy heart, and

it bring no fruit in exchange, curse not thy gods and die, but

build a pyramid in the vineyard where thy love was spent, and

write upon it, Pride hath no conqueror."' It is a mind for a

palace, is it not?"

I could see in the mirror facing him the provoking devilry of

his eyes. I knew that he was trying how much he could stir me. He

guessed my love for her, but I could see he was sure that she no

longer--if she ever had--thought of me. Besides, with a lover's

understanding, I saw also that he liked to talk of her. His eyes, in

the mirror, did not meet mine, but were fixed, as on some distant

and pleasing prospect, though there was, as always, a slight disdain

at his mouth. But the eyes were clear, resolute, and strong, never

wavering--and I never saw them waver--yet in them something distant

and inscrutable. It was a candid eye, and he was candid in his evil;

he made no pretense; and though the means to his ends were wicked,

they were never low. Presently, glancing round the room, I saw an

easel on which was a canvas. He caught my glance.

"Silly work for a soldier and a gentleman," he said, "but silliness

is a great privilege. It needs as much skill to carry folly as to be

an ambassador. Now, you are often much too serious, Captain Moray."

At that he rose, and, after putting on his coat, came over to

the easel and threw up the cloth, exposing a portrait of Alixe! It

had been painted in by a few bold strokes, full of force and life,

yet giving her face more of that look which comes to women bitterly

wise in the ways of this world than I cared to see. The treatment

was daring, and it cut me like a knife that the whole painting had

a red glow: the dress was red, the light falling on the hair was

red, the shine of the eyes was red also. It was fascinating, but

weird, and, to me, distressful. There flashed through my mind the

remembrance of Mathilde in her scarlet robe as she stood on the

Heights that momentous night of my arrest. I looked at the picture

in silence. He kept gazing at it with a curious, half-quizzical

smile, as if he were unconscious of my presence. At last he said,

with a slight knitting of his brows:

"It is strange--strange. I sketched that in two nights ago, by

the light of the fire, after I had come from the Chateau St.

Louis--from memory, as you see. It never struck me where the effect

was taken from, that singular glow over all the face and figure.

But now I see it; it returns: it is the impression of colour in the

senses, left from the night that lady-bug Mathilde flashed out on

the Heights! A fine--a fine effect! H'm! for another such one might

give another such Mathilde!"

At that moment we were both startled by a sound behind us, and,

wheeling, we saw Voban, a mad look in his face, in the act of

throwing at Doltaire a short spear which he had caught up from a

corner. The spear flew from his hand even as Doltaire sprang aside,

drawing his sword with great swiftness. I thought he must have been

killed, but the rapidity of his action saved him, for the spear

passed his shoulder so close that it tore away a shred of his coat,

and stuck in the wall behind him. In another instant Doltaire had

his sword-point at Voban's throat. The man did not cringe, did not

speak a word, but his hands clinched, and the muscles of his face

worked painfully. There was at first a fury in Doltaire's face and

a metallic hardness in his eyes, and I was sure he meant to pass

his sword through the other's body; but after standing for a moment,

death hanging on his sword-point, he quietly lowered his weapon,

and, sitting on a chair-arm, looked curiously at Voban, as one

might sit and watch a mad animal within a cage. Voban did not stir,

but stood rooted to the spot, his eyes, however, never moving

from Doltaire. It was clear that he had looked for death, and now

expected punishment and prison. Doltaire took out his handkerchief

and wiped a sweat from his cheeks. He turned to me soon, and said,

in a singularly impersonal way, as though he were speaking of some

animal:

"He had great provocation. The Duchess de Valois had a young panther

once which she had brought up from the milk. She was inquisitive,

and used to try its temper. It was good sport, but one day she

took away its food, gave it to the cat, and pointed her finger at

monsieur the panther. The Duchess de Valois never bared her breast

thereafter to an admiring world--a panther's claws leave scars." He

paused, and presently continued: "You remember it, Voban; you were

the Duke's valet then--you see I recall you! Well, the panther lost

his head, both figuratively and in fact. The panther did not mean to

kill, maybe, but to kill the lady's beauty was death to her....

Voban, yonder spear was poisoned!"

He wiped his face, and said to me, "I think you saw that at the

dangerous moment I had no fear; yet now when the game is in my own

hands, my cheek runs with cold sweat. How easy to be charged with

cowardice! Like evaporation, the hot breath of peril passing

suddenly into the cold air of safety leaves this!"--he wiped his

cheek again.

He rose, moved slowly to Voban, and, pricking him with his

sword, said, "You are a bungler, barber. Now listen. I never

wronged you; I have only been your blister. I prick your sores at

home. Tut! tut! they prick them openly in the market-place. I gave

you life a minute ago; I give you freedom now. Some day I may ask

that life for a day's use, and then, Voban, then will you give it?"

There was a moment's pause, and the barber answered, "M'sieu',

I owe you nothing. I would have killed you then; you may kill me,

if you will."

Doltaire nodded musingly. Something was passing through his

mind. I judged he was thinking that here was a man who as a servant

would be invaluable.

"Well, well, we can discuss the thing at leisure, Voban," he

said at last. "Meanwhile you may wait here till Captain Moray has

breakfasted, and then you shall be at his service; and I would

have a word with you, also."

Turning with a polite gesture to me, he led the way into the

breakfast-room, and at once, half famished, I was seated at the

table, drinking a glass of good wine, and busy with a broiled

whitefish of delicate quality. We were silent for a time, and the

bird in the alcove kept singing as though it were in Eden, while

chiming in between the rhythms there came the silvery sound of

sleigh-bells from the world without. I was in a sort of dream,

and I felt there must be a rude awakening soon. After a while,

Doltaire, who seemed thinking keenly, ordered the servant to take

in a glass of wine to Voban.

He looked up at me after a little, as if he had come back from a

long distance, and said, "It is my fate to have as foes the men I

would have as friends, and as friends the men I would have as foes.

The cause of my friends is often bad; the cause of my enemies is

sometimes good. It is droll. I love directness, yet I have ever

been the slave of complication. I delight in following my reason,

yet I have been of the motes that stumble in the sunlight. I have

enough cruelty in me, enough selfishness and will, to be a ruler,

and yet I have never held an office in my life. I love true

diplomacy, yet I have been comrade to the official liar, and am

the captain of intrigue--la! la!"

"You have never had an enthusiasm, a purpose?" said I.

He laughed, a dry, ironical laugh. "I have both an enthusiasm

and a purpose," he answered, "or you would by now be snug in bed

forever."

I knew what he meant, though he could not guess I understood.

He was referring to Alixe and the challenge she had given him.

I did not feel that I had anything to get by playing a part of

friendliness, and besides, he was a man to whom the boldest

speaking was always palatable, even when most against himself.

"I am sure neither would bear daylight," said I.

"Why, I almost blush to say that they are both honest--would at

this moment endure a moral microscope. The experience, I confess,

is new, and has the glamour of originality."

"It will not stay honest," I retorted. "Honesty is a new toy

with you. You will break it on the first rock that shows."

"I wonder," he answered, "I wonder, ... and yet I suppose you are

right. Some devilish incident will twist things out of gear, and

then the old Adam must improvise for safety and success. Yes, I

suppose my one beautiful virtue will get a twist."

What he had said showed me his mind as in a mirror. He had no

idea that I had the key to his enigmas. I felt as had Voban in

the other room. I could see that he had set his mind on Alixe,

and that she had roused in him what was perhaps the first honest

passion of his life.

What further talk we might have had I can not tell, but while we

were smoking and drinking coffee the door opened suddenly, and the

servant said, "His Excellency the Marquis de Vaudreuil!"

Doltaire got to his feet, a look of annoyance crossing his face;

but he courteously met the Governor, and placed a chair for him.

The Governor, however, said frostily, "Monsieur Doltaire, it must

seem difficult for Captain Moray to know who is Governor in Canada,

since he has so many masters. I am not sure who needs assurance

most upon the point, you or he. This is the second time he has

been feasted at the Intendance when he should have been in prison.

I came too late that other time; now it seems I am opportune."

Doltaire's reply was smooth: "Your Excellency will pardon the

liberty. The Intendance was a sort of halfway house between

the citadel and the jail."

"There is news from France," the Governor said, "brought from

Gaspe. We meet in council at the Chateau in an hour. A guard

is without to take Captain Moray to the common jail."

In a moment more, after a courteous good-by from Doltaire, and a

remark from the Governor to the effect that I had spoiled his

night's sleep to no purpose, I was soon on my way to the common

jail, where arriving, what was my pleased surprise to see Gabord!

He had been told off to be my especial guard, his services at the

citadel having been deemed so efficient. He was outwardly surly--as

rough as he was ever before the world, and without speaking a word

to me, he had a soldier lock me in a cell.