, upon their right,
they pushed onwards as swiftly as they could, for the sun was so low in
the heavens that the bushes in the clearings threw shadows like trees.
Then suddenly, as they peered in front of them between the trunks, the
green of the sward turned to the blue of the water, and they saw a broad
river running swiftly before them. In France it would have seemed a
mighty stream, but, coming fresh from the vastness of the St. Lawrence,
their eyes were used to great sheets of water. But Amos and De Catinat
had both been upon the bosom of the Richelieu before, and their hearts
bounded as they looked upon it, for they knew that this was the straight
path which led them, the one to home, and the other to peace and
freedom. A few days' journeying down there, a few more along the lovely
island-studded lakes of Champlain and Saint Sacrament, under the shadow
of the tree-clad Adirondacks, and they would be at the headquarters of
the Hudson, and their toils and their dangers be but a thing of gossip
for the winter evenings.

Across the river was the terrible Iroquois country, and at two points
they could see the smoke of fires curling up into the evening air.
They had the Jesuit's word for it that none of the war-parties had
crossed yet, so they followed the track which led down the eastern bank.
As they pushed onwards, however, a stern military challenge suddenly
brought them to a stand, and they saw the gleam of two musket barrels
which covered them from a thicket overlooking the path.

"We are friends," cried De Catinat.

"Whence come you, then?" asked an invisible sentinel.

"From Quebec."

"And whither are you going?"

"To visit Monsieur Charles de la Noue, seigneur of Sainte Marie."

"Very good. It is quite safe, Du Lhut. They have a lady with them,
too. I greet you, madame, in the name of my father."

Two men had emerged from the bushes, one of whom might have passed as a
full-blooded Indian, had it not been for these courteous words which he
uttered in excellent French. He was a tall slight young man, very dark,
with piercing black eyes, and a grim square relentless mouth which could
only have come with Indian descent. His coarse flowing hair was
gathered up into a scalp-lock, and the eagle feather which he wore in it
was his only headgear. A rude suit of fringed hide with caribou-skin
mocassins might have been the fellow to the one which Amos Green was
wearing, but the gleam of a gold chain from