"You want me--" I said, bewildered.

"I repeat that you are not handsome,"--I think he emphasized this
unduly,--"that you are self-effacing, inconspicuous; in short, you are
not a man to draw suspicion. You might travel anywhere and scarcely be
noticed,--I have observed that about you. In addition to this you are
wary, you are discreet, you are painstaking. I ask you to go first to
St. Louis, in Louisiana territory, and this for two reasons. First,
because it will draw any chance suspicion from your real objective, New
Orleans; and second, because it is necessary to get letters to New
Orleans from such leading citizens of St. Louis as Colonel Chouteau and
Monsieur Gratiot, and I will give you introductions to them. You are
then to take passage to New Orleans in a barge of furs which Monsieur
Gratiot is sending down. Mind, we do not expect that you will obtain
proof that Miro is paying Wilkinson money. If you do, so much the
better; but we believe that both are too sharp to leave any tracks. You
will make a report, however, upon the conditions under which our tobacco
is being received, and of all other matters which you may think germane
to the business in hand. Will you go?"

I had made up my mind.

"Yes, I will go," I answered.

"Good," said Mr. Wharton, but with no more enthusiasm than he had
previously shown; "I thought I had not misjudged you. Is your law
business so onerous that you could not go to-morrow?"

I laughed.

"I think I could settle what affairs I have by noon, Mr. Wharton," I
replied.

"Egad, Mr. Ritchie, I like your manner," said he; "and now for a few
details, and you may go to bed."

He sat with me half an hour longer, carefully reviewing his instructions,
and then he left me to a night of contemplation.

CHAPTER VIII

TO ST. LOUIS

By eleven o'clock the next morning I had wound up my affairs, having
arranged with a young lawyer of my acquaintance to take over such cases
as I had, and I was busy in my room packing my saddle-bags for the
journey. The warm scents of spring were wafted through the open door and
window, smells of the damp earth giving forth the green things, and
tender shades greeted my eyes when I paused and raised my head to think.
Purple buds littered the black ground before my door-step, and against
the living green of the grass I saw the red stain of a robin's breast as
he hopped spasmodically hither and thither, now pausing immovable with
his head raised, now to