Gaspard clapped the house door to behind him and put up the bar.  He was not afraid of Phips and the fleet, of battle or night attack, but the terror which walked in the darkness of sorcerers’ times abjectly bowed his old legs.

“O good Ste. Anne, pray for us!” he whispered, using an invocation familiar to his lips.  “If loups-garous are abroad, also, what is to become of this unhappy land?”

There was a rattling knock on his door.  It might be made by the hilt of a sword; or did a loup-garou ever clatter paw against man’s dwelling?  Gaspard climbed on his bed.

“Father Gaspard!  Father Gaspard!  Are you within?”

“Who is there?”

“Le Moyne de Sainte-Helene.  Don’t you know my voice?”

“My master Sainte-Helene, are you alone?”

“Quite alone, except for my horse tied to your apple-tree.  Let me in.”

The command was not to be slighted.  Gaspard got down and admitted his visitor.  More than once had Sainte-Helene come to this hearth.  He appreciated the large fire, and sat down on a chair with heavy legs which were joined by bars resting on the floor.

“My hands tingle.  The dust on these, flint roads is cold.”

“But Monsieur Sainte-Helene never walked with his hands in the dust,” protested Gaspard.  The erect figure, bright with all the military finery of that period, checked even his superstition by imposing another kind of awe.

“The New England men expect to make us bite it yet,” responded Sainte-Helene.  “Saint-Denis is anxious about you, old man.  Why don’t you go to the fort?”

“I will go to-morrow,” promised Gaspard, relaxing sheepishly from terror.  “These New Englanders have not yet landed, and one’s own bed is very comfortable in the cool nights.”

“I am used to sleeping anywhere.”

“Yes, monsieur, for you are young.”

“It would make you young again, Gaspard, to see Count Frontenac.  I wish all New France had seen him yesterday when he defied Phips and sent the envoy back to the fleet.  The officer was sweating; our mischievous fellows had blinded him at the water’s edge, and dragged him, to the damage of his shins, over all the barricades of Mountain Street.  He took breath and courage when they turned him loose before the governor,—­though the sight of Frontenac startled him,—­and handed over the letter of his commandant requiring the surrender of Quebec.”

“My faith, Monsieur Sainte-Helene, did the governor blow him out of the room?”

“The man offered his open watch, demanding an answer within the hour.  The governor said, ’I do not need so much time.  Go back at once to your master and tell him I will answer this insolent message by the mouths of my cannon.’”

“By all the saints, that was a good word!” swore Gaspard, slapping his knee with his wool cap.  “Neither the Iroquois nor the Bostonnais will run over us, now that the old governor is back.  You heard him say it, monsieur?”