y smells of
spring, odours of leaves water-soaked by melting snows, the faint
perfume of flowers pushing up through mats of verdure, blew in on the
night breeze.

Pushing aside the flap, I looked out. The spur of a steep declivity
cut athwart the cave. Now I could guess where I was. This was the
hill down which I had stumbled that night the voices had come from the
ground. Here the masked man had sprung from the thicket. Not far off
M. Radisson had first met the Indians. To reach the French Habitation
I had but to follow the river.

That hope set me pacing again for exercise; and the faster I walked the
faster raced thoughts over the events of the crowded years. Again the
Prince Rupert careened seaward, bearing little Hortense to England.
Once more Ben Gillam swaggered on the water-front of Boston Town,
boasting all that he would do when he had ship of his own. Then Jack
Battle, building his castles of fortune for love of Hortense, and all
unconsciously letting slip the secret of good Boston men deep involved
in pirate schemes. The scene shifted to the far north, and a masked
man had leaped from the forest dark only to throw down his weapon when
the firelight shone on my face. Again the white darkness of the storm,
the three shadowy figures and Le Borgne sent to guide us back to the
fort. Again, to beat of drum and shriek of fife, M. Radisson was
holding his own against the swarming savages that assailed the New
Englanders' fort. Then I was living over the unspeakable horror of the
Indian massacre ending in that awful wait on the crest of the hill.

The memory brought a chill as of winter cold. With my back to both
doors I stood shuddering over the blue fire. Whatever logicians may
say, we do not reason life's conclusions out. Clouds blacken the
heavens till there comes the lightning-flash. So do our intuitions
leap unwarned from the dark. 'Twas thus I seemed to fathom the mystery
of those interlopers. Ben Gillam had been chosen to bring the pirate
ship north because his father, of the Hudson's Bay Company, could
screen him from English spies. Mr. Stocking, of Boston, was another
partner to the venture, who could shield Ben from punishment in New
England. But the third partner was hiding inland to defraud the others
of the furs. That was the meaning of Ben's drunken threats. Who was
the third partner? Had not Eli Kirke planned trading in the north with
Mr. Stocking? Were the pirates some agent