“It is absurd; truthfully, it is.”  She swept the nuts to the ground.

“But supposing I change all this into something more than absurd?  Supposing I should suddenly take you in my arms?  There is no one in sight.  I am strong.  Supposing, then, I kissed you, taking a tithe of your promises?”

She looked at him uneasily.  Starting a fire was all very well, but the touch of it!

“Supposing that I took you away somewhere, alone, with me, to a place where no one would find us?  I do not speak, you say; but I am thinking, thinking, and every thought means danger to you, to myself, to the past and the future.  How do these suppositions appeal to you, Madame?”

Had he moved, madame would have been frightened; but as he remained in the same easy attitude, her fear had no depths.

“But I shall do none of these things because . . . because it would be hardly worth while.  I tried to win your love honestly; but as I failed, let us say no more about it.  I shall make no inquiries into your peculiar purpose; since you have accomplished it, there is nothing more to be said, save that you are not honest.”

“Let us be going,” she said, standing.  “It will be twilight ere we reach the settlement.”

“Very well;” and he halloed for Victor.

The way back to the fort was one of unbroken silence.  Neither madame nor the Chevalier spoke again.

The Chevalier had some tasks to perform that evening which employed his time far beyond the meal hour.  When he entered the mess-room it was deserted save for the presence of Corporal Fremin, one of the dissatisfied colonists.  Several times he had been found unduly under the influence of apricot brandy.  Du Puys had placed him in the guardhouse at three different periods for this misdemeanor.  Where he got the brandy none could tell, and the corporal would not confess to the Jesuit Fathers, nor to his brother, who was a priest.  Unfortunately, he had been drinking again to-day.  He sat opposite the Chevalier, smoking moodily, his little eyes blinking, blinking.

“Corporal,” said the Chevalier, “will you pass me the corn?”

“Reach for it yourself,” replied the corporal, insolently.  He went on smoking.

The Chevalier sat back in his chair, dumfounded.  “Pass me that corn!” peremptorily.

The intoxicated soldier saw nothing in the flashing eyes; so he shrugged.  “I am not your lackey.”

The Chevalier was up in an instant.  Passing quickly around the table he inserted his fingers between the corporal’s collar and his neck, twisting him out of his chair and literally lifting him to his feet.

“What do you mean by this insolence?  Pah!” scenting the brandy; “you have been drinking.”

“What’s that to you?  You are not my superior officer.  Let go of my collar.”

“I am an officer in the king’s army, and there is an unwritten law that all non-commissioned officers are my inferiors, here or elsewhere, and must obey me.  You shall go to the guardhouse.  I asked nothing of you but a common courtesy, and you became insolent.  To the guardhouse you shall go.”