“We neither call our women ‘she’ nor give them market value,” I retorted.

Thereupon M. de Radisson falls in such fits of laughter, I had thought he must split his baldrick.

“Pardieu!” he laughed, wiping the tears away with a tangled lace thing fit for a dandy, “Pardieu!  ’Tis not your girl-page?  ‘Tis the ship o’ that hangdog of a New England captain!”

The thing came in a jiffy.  Sieur Radisson, having deserted the English Fur Company, was setting up for himself.  He was spying the strength of his rivals for the north sea.

“You praised my wit.  I have but given you a sample.”

Then I told him all I knew of the ship, and M. de Radisson laughed again till he was like to weep.

“How is she called?” he asked.

“The Prince Rupert,” said I.

“Ha!  Then the same crew of gentlemen’s scullions and courtiers’ valets stuffing the lockers full o’ trash to trade on their master’s account.  A pretty cheat for the Company!”

The end of it was, M. Radisson invited me to join his ships.  “A beaver-skin for a needle, Ramsay!  Twenty otter for an awl!  Wealth for a merchant prince,” he urged.

But no sooner had I grasped at this easy way out of difficulty than the Frenchman interrupts:  “Hold back, man!  Do you know the risk?”

“No—­nor care one rush!”

“Governor Frontenac demands half of the furs for a license to trade, but M. de la Barre, who comes to take his place, is a friend of La Chesnaye’s, and La Chesnaye owns our ships——­”

“And you go without a license?”

“And the galleys for life——­”

“If you’re caught,” said I.

“Pardieu!” he laughed, “yes—­if we’re caught!”

“I’d as lief go to the galleys for fur-trading as the scaffold for witchcraft,” said I.

With that our bargain was sealed.

PART II

Now comes that part of a life which deals with what you will say no one man could do, yet the things were done; with wonders stranger than witchcraft, yet were true.  But because you have never lived a sword-length from city pavement, nor seen one man holding his own against a thousand enemies, I pray you deny not these things.

Each life is a shut-in valley, says the jongliere; but Manitou, who strides from peak to peak, knows there is more than one valley, which had been a maxim among the jonglieres long before one Danish gentleman assured another there were more things in heaven and earth than philosophy dreamed.

CHAPTER VI

THE ROARING FORTIES

Keen as an arrow from twanging bowstring, Pierre Radisson set sail over the roaring seas for the northern bay.