Within the fort a score of lights flew up and down like will-o’-the-wisps, and Colonel Clark, standing on the steps of the governor’s house, gave out his orders and despatched his messengers.  Me he sent speeding through the village to tell Captain Bowman to patrol the outskirts of the town, that no runner might get through to warn Fort Chartres and Cohos, as some called Cahokia.  None stirred save the few Indians left in the place, and these were brought before Clark in the fort, sullen and defiant, and put in the guard-house there.  And Rocheblave, when he appeared, was no better, and was put back in his house under guard.

As for the papers in the despatch box, they revealed I know not what briberies of the savage nations and plans of the English.  But of other papers we found none, though there must have been more.  Madame Rocheblave was suspected of having hidden some in the inviolable portions of her dress.

At length the cocks crowing for day proclaimed the morning, and while yet the blue shadow of the bluff was on the town, Colonel Clark sallied out of the gate and walked abroad.  Strange it seemed that war had come to this village, so peaceful and remote.  And even stranger it seemed to me to see these Arcadian homes in the midst of the fierce wilderness.  The little houses with their sloping roofs and wide porches, the gardens ablaze with color, the neat palings,—­all were a restful sight for our weary eyes.  And now I scarcely knew our commander.  For we had not gone far ere, timidly, a door opened and a mild-visaged man, in the simple workaday smock that the French wore, stood, hesitating, on the steps.  The odd thing was that he should have bowed to Clark, who was dressed no differently from Bowman and Harrod and Duff; and the man’s voice trembled piteously as he spoke.  It needed not John Duff to tell us that he was pleading for the lives of his family.

“He will sell himself as a slave if your Excellency will spare them,” said Duff, translating.

But Clark stared at the man sternly.

“I will tell them my plans at the proper time,” he said and when Duff had translated this the man turned and went silently into his house again, closing the door behind him.  And before we had traversed the village the same thing had happened many times.  We gained the fort again, I wondering greatly why he had not reassured these simple people.  It was Bowman who asked this question, he being closer to Clark than any of the other captains.  Clark said nothing then, and began to give out directions for the day.  But presently he called the Captain aside.

“Bowman,” I heard him say, “we have one hundred and fifty men to hold a province bigger than the whole of France, and filled with treacherous tribes in the King’s pay.  I must work out the problem for myself.”

Bowman was silent.  Clark, with that touch which made men love him and die for him, laid his hand on the Captain’s shoulder.