no. A more silent man I never knew, yet
courteous and stately withal, and well liked by the men. But it was to
Achille Broussard my heart went out in those days of loneliness. His
almost childish lightness of disposition and his friendly ways won me
completely, and we became fast comrades. A noble looking lad, with the
strength of a young Titan, and the blonde curls of a woman. During the
long idle hours of the afternoon it was his custom to banter me for a
bout at swords, and Levert generally acted as our master of the lists.
At first he was much my superior with the foils, for during his days
with the Embassy at Madrid, and in the schools at Paris, he had learned
those hundreds of showy and fancy little tricks of which we in the
forests knew nothing. However, I doubted not that on the field our
rougher ways and sterner methods would count for quite as much.

With all the five long weeks of daily practice, I gathered many things
from him, until one day we had an experience which made us lay the
foils aside for good.

We had been sitting after the dinner hour, discussing his early life in
Paris. He wound up with his usual declaration, "As for myself, give me
the gorgeous plays, the fetes and smiles of the Montespan, rather than
the prayers, the masses and the sober gowns of de Maintenon. And now
it is your turn, comrade; let us know something of your escapades, your
days of folly in dear old Paris."

"I have never seen Paris," I answered simply.

"What! Never been to Paris? Then, man, you have never lived. But
where have you spent all your days?"

"In the colonies--Quebec, Montreal, Biloxi. But now I will have an
opportunity, for I am going--"

I had almost told something of my mission, ere I checked a too fluent
confidence.

Levert, who had been pacing up and down the deck in his absorbed and
inattentive way, dropped his blade across my shoulder and challenged me
to the foils.

"No, it is too early yet," Achille replied, "besides, we were talking
of other things. As you were saying, comrade, you go--?"

"Oh, you two talk too much," Levert broke in again, "let us have a
bout; I'm half a mind I can handle a foil myself. A still tongue, a
clear head and a sharp blade are the tools of Fortune."

It seemed almost that he had twice interrupted purposely to keep me
from talking. I thought I read that deeper meaning in his eyes.
Somehow I grew to distrust him from that moment. What consequence was