“Well?” said Paul.

“What happened?” said Long Jim.

“Anything to tell?” said Tom Ross.

“How’s your shoulder, Paul?” asked Henry.

“Fast getting well,” replied Paul, who knew that his comrade would speak in his own good time.

Henry sat on the floor and leaned against the wall in as comfortable a position as he could assume.  Then he looked rather humorously at his comrades.

“Alvarez wanted to bribe me,” he said.

“To bribe you?  What do you mean?”

“Yes, to bribe me—­and all of us together.  He wanted us to serve him here in Louisiana, and help him in an attempt to bring over Kentucky to Spain.”

“That is, he wanted to make Braxton Wyatts out of us?” said Paul.

“You put it exactly right, Paul,” said Henry, “I laughed at him, and called him by the names that belonged to him.  He brought in Braxton Wyatt and the soldiers and ordered me to be put in irons, there in his presence.”

“What!” exclaimed Paul, “did he dare that, too?”

“Yes.  His object, of course, was to humiliate me—­and all of us.  It was stopped by one who came in at the right moment.  You couldn’t guess who it was.”

“It must a-been Shif’less Sol,” said Long Jim, whose mind ran to physical deeds.  “I guess he sent a bullet right into the middle uv that rascal crew.  Sol’s the boy to be right on the spot when he’s needed.”

Henry laughed.

“No, Jim,” he said.  “That’s a pretty wild guess.  It was none other than Father Montigny, the man whom we helped.  He paid us back sooner than we thought.  You ought to have seen him, Paul.  He looked like an avenging angel.  He stood there, a single, unarmed man, and they were afraid of him.  I could see fear on every one of their faces.”

Paul’s vivid imagination instantly painted the whole scene.  It appealed to him with tremendous power.  It was the triumph of mind and character over force and wickedness.

“I can see Father Montigny now,” he said.  “A man who always does right and has no fear whatever of death, is afraid of nothing, either in this world or the world to come.”

“Which gives him a pow’ful sight uv freedom,” said Long Jim.

“When he told them to stop they took away their balls and chain,” said Henry, “and sent me back here.  Alvarez realized that he had gone too far, but I think that he fears Father Montigny for other reasons, too.  The priest may put the Governor General on his guard.”

“So we ain’t alone,” said Long Jim musingly.  “Curious how you git help when you ain’t expectin’ it.  The wicked hev it their way fur a while, an’ then they don’t.  They don’t ever seem able to finish up their work.  Sometimes I think the right is jest like a river flowin’ on in its nateral channel, an’ boun’ to git to the sea after a while, no matter what happens.  The wrong is all them dams, an’ san’ bars an’ snags, and brush an’ drift-wood that people an’ chance pile up in the way.  They do choke up the waters, an’ send ’em around in other channels, an’ make a heap uv trouble, but by and by them waters git to the sea jest the same.”