iture of my former
prison was being shifted to my new one. After a word or two more, with
Stevens's assurance that the British had recovered from Braddock's
defeat and would soon be knocking at the portals of the Chateau St.
Louis, we parted, and soon Doltaire and I got out at the high stone
steps of the palace.

Standing there a moment, I looked round. In this space surrounding the
Intendance was gathered the history of New France. This palace, large
enough for the king of a European country with a population of a
million, was the official residence of the commercial ruler of a
province. It was the house of the miller, and across the way was the
King's storehouse, La Friponne, where poor folk were ground between the
stones. The great square was already filling with people who had come to
trade. Here were barrels of malt being unloaded; there, great sacks
of grain, bags of dried fruits, bales of home-made cloth, and loads of
fine-sawn boards and timber. Moving about among the peasants were the
regular soldiers in their white uniforms faced with blue, red, yellow,
or violet, with black three-cornered hats, and black gaiters from foot
to knee, and the militia in coats of white with black facings. Behind a
great collar of dogskin a pair of jet-black eyes flashed out from under
a pretty forehead; and presently one saw these same eyes grown sorrowful
or dull under heavy knotted brows, which told of a life too vexed by
care and labour to keep alive a spark of youth's romance. Now the bell
in the tower above us rang a short peal, the signal for the opening of
La Friponne, and the bustling crowd moved towards its doors. As I stood
there on the great steps, I chanced to look along the plain, bare front
of the palace to an annex at the end, and standing in a doorway opening
on a pair of steps was Voban. I was amazed that he should be there--the
man whose life had been spoiled by Bigot. At the same moment Doltaire
motioned to him to return inside; which he did.

Doltaire laughed at my surprise, and as he showed me inside the
palace said: "There is no barber in the world like Voban. Interesting
interesting! I love to watch his eye when he draws the razor down my
throat. It would be so easy to fetch it across; but Voban, as you see,
is not a man of absolute conviction. It will be sport, some day, to
put Bigot's valet to bed with a broken leg or a fit of spleen, and send
Voban to shave him."

"Where is Mathilde?" I asked, as thoug