Thus very deftly and without alarming me he had given me a notion of the delicate nature of my task.  He had great faith in me those days.  Well, I had had remarkably good luck with every matter he had put into my hands.  He used to say that I would make a diplomat and playfully called me “Lord Chesterfield”—­perhaps because I had unconsciously acquired a dignity and courtesy of manner beyond my years a little.

“Mr. Purvis” had been busy building up a conversational reputation for frightfulness in the gardens.  He was held in awe by a number of the simple-minded men with whom he worked.  For him life had grown very pleasant again—­a sweet, uninterrupted dream of physical power and fleeing enemies.  I tremble to think what might have happened if his strength and courage had equaled his ambition.  I smiled when the judge spoke of his nerve and vigor.  Still I was glad of his company, for I enjoyed Purvis.

I had drafted my letters for the day and was about to close my desk and start on my journey when Louis Latour came in and announced that he had brought the writs from the judge and was going with me.

“You will need a sheriff’s deputy anyhow, and I have been appointed for just this kind of work,” he assured me.

“I don’t object to your going but you must remember that I am in command,” I said, a little taken back, for I had no good opinion either of his prudence or his company.

He was four years older than I but I had better judgment, poor as it was, and our chief knew it.

“The judge told me that I could go but that I should be under your orders,” he answered.  “I’m not going to be a fool.  I’m trying to establish a reputation for good sense myself.”

We got our dinners and set out soon after one o’clock.  Louis wore a green velvet riding coat and handsome top boots and snug-fitting, gray trousers.  He was a gallant figure on the high-headed chestnut mare which his father had sent to him.  Purvis and I, in our working suits, were like a pair of orderlies following a general.  We rode two of the best saddle horses in the judge’s stable and there were no better in that region.

I had read the deeds of the men we were to visit.  They were brothers and lived on adjoining farms with leases which covered three hundred and fifty acres of land.  Their great-grandfather had agreed to pay a yearly rent forever of sixty-two bushels of good, sweet, merchantable, winter wheat, eight yearling cattle and four sheep in good flesh and sixteen fat hens, all to be delivered in the city of Albany on the first day of January of each year.  So, feeling that I was engaged in a just cause, I bravely determined to serve the writs if possible.