against attack and siege! And at
the earliest opportunity we must send word to the south and to Fort
York."

There were sober faces and anxious hearts behind the stockade that day,
for there could be no longer any doubt that the long-threatened
storm--the struggle for supremacy between the rival fur companies--was
about to break. Nay, for aught any of us knew, open strife might already
be waging in the south, or up on the shores of Hudson Bay; a lonely and
isolated post was ours on the Churchill River.

We held a consultation, and decided to omit no precautionary measures.
Our store of weapons was overhauled, the howitzers were loaded, the
gates and the stockade were strengthened, and men were posted on watch.

The day wore on quietly, and no sign of Indians was reported. I saw
nothing of Flora, but I thought of her constantly, and feared she must
be in much distress of mind. I confess, to my shame, that it caused me
some elation to reflect that the marriage was now likely to be
indefinitely postponed, but there I erred, as I was soon to learn.

At about four o'clock of the afternoon, when darkness was coming on, I
was smoking a pipe in the men's quarters. Hearing shouts and a sudden
commotion, I ran out in haste, thinking the Indians were approaching;
but to my surprise, the sentries were unbarring the gates, and no sooner
had they opened them than in came a couple of voyageurs, followed by two
teams of dogs and a pair of sledges. The two occupants of the latter, in
spite of the muffling of furs, I recognized at once. The one was my old
Quebec acquaintance, Mr. Christopher Burley, the London law clerk; the
other, to my ill-concealed dismay, was an elderly priest whom I had
often seen at Fort York.

CHAPTER XVIII.

A STOLEN INTERVIEW.

The news of so unexpected an event spread quickly through the fort, and
by the time the gates had been closed and barred again, men were
hurrying forward from all sides. They surrounded the travelers, greeting
them eagerly, and plying them and their guides with rapid questions.

I held aloof, for I was in too bitter a mood to trust myself to speech.
The reasons that had brought the London law clerk to Fort Royal--a journey
of hundreds of miles through the wilderness--gave me no concern; but I
knew what Father Cleary's visit meant, and what would follow speedily on
his arrival. Surely, I reflected, there could be no man