self!" cried the boy. "Thou art the only man on earth I would
choke with a rope."

"Will no one be reprieved?"

D'Aulnay's eye, traveled from scorn to scorn along the row.

"It is but the pushing aside of a slab. They are all stubborn heretics,
Father Vincent. We waste time. I should be inspecting the contents of
this fort."

The women and children were flattening themselves like terrified
swallows against the gate; for through the hum of stirring soldiery
penetrated to them from outside a hint of voices not unknown. The
sentinels had watched a party approaching; but it was so small, and
hampered, moreover, by a woman and some object like a tiny gilded sedan
chair, that they did not notify the governor. One of the party was a
Jesuit priest by his cassock, and another his donne. These never came
from La Tour. Another was a tall Hollandais; and two servants lightly
carried the sedan up the slope. A few more people seemed to wait behind
for the purpose of making a camp, and there were scarce a dozen of the
entire company.

Marie had borne without visible exhaustion the labors of this siege, the
anguish of treachery and disappointment, her enemy's breach of faith and
cruel parade of her. The garrison were ranged ready upon the plank; but
she held herself in tense control, and waited beside Lady Dorinda, with
her back toward the gate, while her friends outside parleyed with her
enemy. D'Aulnay refused to admit any one until he had dealt with the
garrison. The Jesuit was reported to him as Father Isaac Jogues, and the
name had its effect, as it then had everywhere among people of the Roman
faith. No soldier would be surprised at meeting a Jesuit priest anywhere
in the New World. But D'Aulnay begged Father Jogues to excuse him while
he finished a moment's duty, and he would then come out and escort his
guest into the fortress.

The urgent demand, however, of a missionary to whom even the king had
shown favor, was not to be denied. D'Aulnay had the gates set ajar; and
pushing through their aperture came in Father Jogues with his donne and
two companions.

The governor advanced in displeasure. He would have put out all but the
priest, but the gates were slammed to prevent others from entering, and
slammed against the chair in which the sentinels could see a red-headed
dwarf. The weird melody of her screaming threats kept them dubious while
they grinned. The gates being shut, Marie fled through ranks of
men-at-arms to An