the
anteroom. A moment later Pierre Radisson came out with eyes alight and
face elate.

"I've signed to sail in three days," he announced. "Do you go with me
or no?"

Two memories came back: one of a face between a westering sun and a
golden sea, and I hesitated; the other, of a cold, pallid, disdainful
look from the royal box.

"I go."

And entering the council chamber, I signed the papers without one
glance at the terms. Gentlemen sat all about the long table, and at
the head was the governor of the company--the Duke of York, talking
freely with M. de Radisson.

My Lord Ashley would know if anything but furs grew in that wild New
World.

"Furs?" says M. Radisson. "Sir, mark my words, 'tis a world that grows
empires--also men," with an emphasis which those court dandies could
not understand.

But the wise gentlemen only smiled at M. Radisson's warmth.

"If it grew good soldiers for our wars--" begins one military gentleman.

"Aye," flashes back M. Radisson ironically, "if it grows men for your
wars and your butchery and your shambles! Mark my words: it is a land
that grows men good for more than killing," and he smiles half in
bitterness.

"'Tis a prodigious expensive land in diplomacy when men like you are
let loose in it," remarks Arlington.

His Royal Highness rose to take his leave.

"You will present a full report to His Majesty at Oxford," he orders M.
Radisson in parting.

Then the council dispersed.

"Oxford," says M. Radisson, as we picked our way home through the dark
streets; "an I go to meet the king at Oxford, you will see a hornets'
nest of jealousy about my ears."

I did not tell him of the double work implied in Sir John's words with
the prince, for Sir John Kirke was Pierre Radisson's father-in-law. At
the door of the Star and Garter mine host calls out that a
strange-looking fellow wearing a grizzled beard and with a wife as from
foreign parts had been waiting all afternoon for me in my rooms.

"From foreign parts!" repeats M. Radisson, getting into a chair to go
to Sir John's house in Drury Lane. "If they're French spies, send them
right about, Ramsay! We've stopped gamestering!"

"We have; but perhaps the others haven't."

"Let them game," laughs M. Radisson scornfully, as the chair moved off.
Not knowing what to expect I ran up-stairs to my room. At the door I
paused. That morning I had gone from the house light-hearted. Now
interest had died from life. I had b