y have risked the voyage
single-handed.

It was no easy matter to get a vessel. Roberval had returned, and
Charles had no longer his former excuse. It was rumoured at court that
the lovers had been punished for flaunting immorality; and to tell why
he wanted the ship would be to drag the names of Claude and Marguerite
through the mire. This he would not do. He would not even let himself
think of what De Roberval had told him. It was not--it could not be
true! It was true that he had awakened from his dream; he knew that he
could never win Marguerite. What he had learned from Etienne and from
her uncle had banished that wild hope; and all the little circumstances
in their lives, which had before passed unnoticed, now rose before him
to show him how blind and foolish he had been. But he loved her none the
less--rather the more. And when he thought of what she and her lover
must have endured on that desolate island, in the great northern ocean,
his brain beat and his heart throbbed till he thought he must surely go
mad. To save himself, he felt he must start on his journey as soon as
possible.

But there were difficulties in the way. Cartier had disposed of his
ships, and taken up his permanent residence at Limoilou. To purchase a
new vessel would cost money; and Charles, ever prodigal, had but small
means that he could call his own. On Cartier he depended for help; but
that shrewd seaman knew how the enterprise must end, and instead of
putting his hand into his money-bag, he did his utmost to dissuade La
Pommeraye from his purpose.

Finding, however, that his friend had determined on the journey, he at
length got several St Malo merchants to join with him in fitting out a
small craft of fifty tons, ostensibly for the fur trade. The vessel was
an old one, but had several times weathered the Atlantic, and a number
of her old crew expressed themselves willing to join La Pommeraye if he
would offer them a sufficient wage. He had hard work, however, in
getting together six trusty fellows, who, with Etienne and himself,
would undertake the winter journey. But by the beginning of December all
was ready, and the little vessel, amid shaking of heads and prophecies
of misfortune from the knowing ones, steered away for the Channel, and
out towards the Atlantic, where even then a storm was raging.

But they were to meet with disappointment at the very beginning of their
voyage. The masts creaked and groaned; the planks quivered;