your question, when I have had some more satisfactory
experience of Canadians, I shall know better how to answer it."

"And has not your experience of me been satisfactory, monsieur?"
said he, pluming up again.

"You are perfectly qualified to answer that question, yourself,"
I replied, looking "blank requisitions" at him so pointedly that
he simply reddened to the roots of his black hair and held his
tongue, to the amazement of all who had hoped for some further
amusement.

"As for your question, M. Prevost," I continued, rounding on him,
"I made no reflection on Frenchmen in general. They are my comrades,
my brothers-in-arms!" I said, playing to the company at large, by
whom my sentiment was greeted with a burst of applause. "As to
Frenchmen in particular, I have known some who were so dangerous
with the pen that I would indeed hesitate to trust them with the
sword." Now, as Prevost was hated and dreaded for nothing more than
his lying reports to the Minister at home, and as no man in any
position at the table had escaped his venom, my sally was again
greeted not only with applause, but also with a roar of stentorian
laughter.

The whole affair ended in nothing more serious than the hot words
and laughter, for Sarennes, though a braggart, was not evil-tempered,
at least towards me. For Prevost I cared not a maravedi, and would
have spitted him liked a smoked herring at any time with the greatest
pleasure. My chief disappointment was that I had not succeeded in
my attempt to obtain a refusal of Sarennes's request for Kit's
company, an attempt I dared not renew, and was forced to give a
reluctant consent when it was referred to me.

My heart was big with foreboding the last evening we spent together,
and it required an effort almost beyond my powers to refrain from
taking him into my arms and telling him he was my son. I almost
persuaded myself that my life was so wretched, so lonely, so
hopeless, that I would be justified in so doing. But for some reason
or other I did not, why, I cannot pretend to say, and I saw him
march proudly off at daybreak the next morning with my secret still
untold. I wondered if any one would be equally faithful to me.

Such a weary month of January I never passed, for no one knew the
danger of these miserable, skulking little war parties better than
I; and to add to this there was my distrust of Sarennes eating at
my heart every time I tried to make little of my fears.

What wonder