Heralds of Empire Read online

  CHAPTER V

  M. RADISSON AGAIN

  "Good-bye to you, Ramsay," said Jack abruptly.

  "Where to, Jack?" I asked, bestirring myself. I could no more go backto Eli Kirke.

  But little Jack Battle was squirming his wooden clogs into the sand ashe used to dig his toes, and he answered not a word.

  "'Tis early yet for the Grand Banks, Jack. Ben Gillam's ship keeledmast over hull from being ice-logged last spring. The spars were solidwith frozen sleet from the crosstrees to the crow's nest. Your dorieswould be ice-logged for a month yet."

  "It--it--it aren't the Grand Banks no more," stammered Jack.

  His manner arrested me. The honest blue eyes were shifting and histoes at work in the sand.

  "There be gold on the high seas for the taking," vouched Jack. "Anyour fine gentlemen grow rich that way, why mayn't I?"

  "Jack," I warned, thinking of Ben Gillam's craft rigged with sails ofas many colours as Joseph's coat, "Jack--is it a pirate-ship?"

  "No," laughed the sailor lad sheepishly, "'tis a pirateer," meaningthereby a privateer, which was the same thing in those days.

  "Have a care of your pirateers--privateers, Jack," said I, speakingplain. "A gentleman would be run through the gullet with a cleanrapier, but you--you--would be strangled by sentence of court or soldto the Barbadoes."

  "Not if the warden o' the court owns half the ship," protested Jack,smiling queerly under his shaggy brows.

  "Oh--ho!" said I, thinking of Rebecca's father, and beginning tounderstand who supplied money for Ben Gillam's ventures.

  "I'm tired o' being a kick-a-toe and fisticuff to everybody. Now, ifI'd been rich and had a ship, I might 'a' sailed for M. Picot."

  "Or Mistress Hortense," I added, which brought red spots to the sailorlad's cheeks.

  Off he went unanswering, leaving me at gaze across an unbroken sea witha heart heavy as lead.

  "Poor fellow! He will get over it," said I.

  "Another hath need o' the same medicine," came a voice.

  I wheeled, expecting arrest.

  A tall, wiry man, with coal-black hair and deep-set eyes and a scaracross his swarth skin, smiled pleasantly down at me.

  "Now that you have them safely off," said he, still smiling, "betterbegone yourself."

  "I'll thank you for your advice when I ask it, sir," said I, suspiciousof the press-gang infesting that port. Involuntarily I caught at myempty sword-belt.

  "Permit me," proffered the gentleman, with a broader smile, handing outhis own rapier.

  "Sir," said I, "your pardon, but the press-gang have been busy of late."

  "And the sheriffs may be busy to-day," he laughed. "Black arts don'topen stone walls, Ramsay."

  And he sent the blade clanking home to its scabbard. His surtoutfalling open revealed a waistcoat of buckskin. I searched his face.

  "M. de Radisson!"

  "My hero of rescues," and he offered his hand. "And my quondamnephew," he added, laughing; for his wife was a Kirke of the Englishbranch, and my aunt was married to Eli.

  "Eli Kirke cannot know you are here, sir--"

  "Eli Kirke _need_ not know," emphasized Radisson dryly.

  And remembering bits of rumour about M. Radisson deserting the EnglishFur Company, I hastened to add: "Eli Kirke _shall_ not know!"

  "Your wits jump quick enough sometimes," said he. "Now tell me, whoseis she, and what value do you set on her?"

  I was speechless with surprise. However wild a life M. Radisson led,his title of nobility was from a king who awarded patents to gentlemenonly.

  "We neither call our women '_she_' nor give them market value," Iretorted.

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

  "Pardieu!" he laughed, wiping the tears away with a tangled lace thingfit 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 EnglishFur Company, was setting up for himself. He was spying the strength ofhis 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 laughedagain 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' valetsstuffing 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. "Abeaver-skin for a needle, Ramsay! Twenty otter for an awl! Wealth fora merchant prince," he urged.

  But no sooner had I grasped at this easy way out of difficulty than theFrenchman 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 LaChesnaye'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 forwitchcraft," said I.

  With that our bargain was sealed.

  PART II