failed to locate his
body or to furnish further facts to Christine as to the cause of the
accident.

* * * * *

Alfonso Harris meant all he said to Christine in his last words,
"Sometime I may be able to match gold with gold." He might be blind in
love matters, but his mind after a storm always righted itself. That
night when Alfonso reached his hotel, he planned to leave the impression
on Christine's mind that he was dead. To make the deception complete,
his trunk and all effects in his room were left as found by Christine.
Even his watch, pocket book and clothes were left behind in the little
pleasure boat, while he donned an extra suit. A Norwegian captain, who
was about leaving Amsterdam with a cargo for Canada, agreed for fifty
dollars to pick up Alfonso down the harbor and to land him in Quebec.

Fine family, beauty, and gold were powerful incentives to effort to an
ambitious young man like Alfonso, and he was resolved, incognito, to
explore the Great West in search of riches, and once found, he would lay
all at Christine's feet, and again claim her hand.

Jans Jansen, the Norwegian captain, was a jolly good ship-master, and the
fair weather voyage across the Atlantic proved enjoyable. Alfonso always
took his meals with the captain. Jans Jansen's wife and children lived in
Christiania, and his constant talk was that he hoped some day to get rich
and quit the sea. Alfonso made a warm friend of Captain Jansen, who
pledged secrecy as to his escape from Amsterdam.

The captain was robust and his big flowing red beard, blue eyes, and
bravery made him a worthy successor of the ancient vikings of the
Norseland. Jans Jansen enjoyed his pipe, and with his good stories whiled
away many an hour for Alfonso, so that when the ship, under full sail,
entered the Strait of Belle Isle and sailed across the Gulf towards the
River St. Lawrence, both the captain and young Harris regretted that
their sea-voyage was so soon to close.

The entrance of the St. Lawrence River is so broad that the navies of the
world abreast might enter the river undiscovered from either bank. Two
hundred miles up the river, Trinity House, an association of over three
hundred pilots, put aboard a pilot, and at noon next day Captain Jansen
docked his vessel at Quebec.

This old French city is located on a high promontory on the left bank
of the St. Lawrence. Its citadel, one of the strongest fortresses in
America, comm