ded her cheeks.

"Afraid?" she laughed.

"Hortense! Hortense! Do you not hear the drunken revel? Do you know
what it means? This world is full of what a maid must fear. 'Tis her
fear protects her."

"Ah?" asks Hortense.

And she opened the tight-clasped hunting-cloak. A Spanish poniard hung
against the inner folds.

"'Tis her courage must protect her. The wilderness teaches that," says
Hortense, "the wilderness and men like Picot."

Then we clasped hands and ran like children from thicket to rock and
rock to the long stretches of shingly shore. Behind came the
blackamoor and the soldier. The salt spray flew in our faces, the wind
through our hair; and in our hearts, a joy untold. Where a great
obelisk of rock thrust across the way, Hortense halted. She stood on
the lee side of the rock fanning herself with her hat.

"Now you are the old Hortense!"

"I _am_ older, hundreds of years older," laughed Hortense.

The westering sun and the gold light of the sea and the caress of a
spring wind be perilous setting for a fair face. I looked and looked
again.

"Hortense, should an oath to the dead bind the living?"

"If it was right to take the oath, yes," said Hortense.

"Hortense, I may never see you alone again. I promised to treat you as
I would treat a sister----"

"But--" interrupts Hortense.

Footsteps were approaching along the sand. I thought only of the
blackamoor and soldier.

"I promised to treat you as I would a sister--but what--Hortense?"

"But--but I didn't promise to treat you as I would a brother----"

Then a voice from the other side of the rock: "Devil sink my soul to
the bottom of the sea if that viper Frenchman hasn't all our furs
packed away in his hold!"

Then--"A pox on him for a meddlesome--" the voice fell.

Then Ben Gillam again: "Shiver my soul! Let 'im set sail, I say!
Aren't you and me to be shipped on a raft for the English fort at the
foot o' the bay?"

"We'll send 'em all to the bottom o' hell first."

"An you give the word, all my men will rise!"

"Capture the fort--risk the ships--butcher the French!"

Hortense raised her hand and pointed along the shore. Our two guards
were lumbering up and would presently betray our presence. Stealing
forward we motioned their silence. I sent both to listen behind the
rock, while Hortense and I struck into cover of the thicket to regain
the fort.

"Do not fear," said I. "M. Radisson has kept the prisoners in h