garden which the old hunter was obliged to
skirt along its whole length. He heard nothing, saw nothing, except that
he fancied the leafless trees looked down upon him with shadows of
warning. Batoche often said that he understood the language of trees,
and certainly to-night the sight of them impressed his usually
imperturbable soul so that he accelerated his pace. When he reached
about one-third the length of the garden, he distinctly felt that he was
followed. He turned around and saw a dark figure at a distance behind
him. He knew instinctively that there was mischief brewing. He stopped;
the figure stopped. He advanced; it advanced. He crossed the road
diagonally; it crossed. He returned; it returned. He might have rushed
upon his pursuer, but that would probably have occasioned outcries and
other noises, which were naturally to be avoided. He had a recourse to
flight. Swift as a deer he glided along the garden palisade, turned, and
hid himself behind a large tree that formed the corner of the street.
His pursuer was equally fleet and came up to him immediately.

"Give me your musket," he growled in broken French.

"No."

"Follow me to the guard-room."

"No."

"Who are you?"

"Your enemy."

The strange man advanced a step and looked full into Batoche's face.

"Ah! it is you, at last, and disguised in his Majesty's uniform. I knew
I would catch you yet. Take this."

He raised an enormous horse pistol which he pointed at the old man's
forehead. With the left hand Batoche struck up the levelled arm, while
with his right he whipped out a long hunter's knife from his belt. The
struggle was brief. The pistol went off grazing the edge of Batoche's
fox-skin cap, and the hunter's blade plunged deep into the patrolman's
heart. The latter rolled into the snow without a groan, and Batoche fled
with the sound of footsteps, attracted by the pistol's report, sounding
in his ears. He encountered no further obstacle, crossing the wall at
the same spot which he had chosen in the earlier part of the evening,
and almost in sight of a sentinel who was half asleep on his carbine.

"That fellow will never trouble me or M. Belmont again," thought
Batoche. "And what is better they will not know that I did it. I am only
sorry for Monsieur Hardinge, who will have to provide himself with
another servant."

The death of Donald created a great excitement in the town. Besides that
he was well known and much esteemed as a faithful,