do not understand you. Why could not M. de Vaudreuil order me to
fight?"

Dominique stared at his master. "Why, Monseigneur,--seeing that he
sends no troops, it would be a queer message. He could not have the
face."

"Yet he must be intending to strike at the English coming from
Quebec?"

"They are already arrived and encamped at Isle Sainte-Therese below
the city, and another army has come down the Richelieu from the south
and joined them."

"It is clear as daylight. M. de Vaudreuil must be meaning to attack
them instantly, and therefore he cannot spare a detachment--You
follow me?"

"It may be so, Monseigneur," Dominique assented doubtfully.

"'May be so'! It must be so! But unhappily he does not know of this
third army descending upon him; or, rather, he does not know how near
it is. Yet, to win time for him, we must hold up this army at all
costs."

"It is I, Monseigneur, who am puzzled. You cannot be intending--"

"Eh? Speak it out, man!"

"You cannot be intending to await these English!"

"Name of thunder! What else do you suppose? Pray, my dear
Dominique, use your wits. We have to gain time, I tell you--time for
our friends below at Montreal."

"With twenty odd men against as many hundreds? Oh, pardon me,
Monseigneur, but I cannot bring my mind to understand you."

"But since it gains time--"

"They will not stay to snap up such a mouthful. They will sail past
your guns, laughing; unless--great God, Monseigneur! If in truth you
intend this folly, where is Mademoiselle Diane? I did not see her in
any of the boats from La Galette. Whither have you sent her, and in
whose charge?"

"She is yonder on the wall, looking down on us. She will stay; I
have given her my promise."

Dominique came to a halt, white as a ghost. His tongue touched his
dry lips. "Monseigneur!"--the cry broke from him, and he put out a
hand and caught his seigneur by the coat sleeve.

"What is the matter with the man?" The Commandant plucked his arm
away and stood back, outraged by this breach of decorum.

But Dominique, having found his voice, continued heedless. "She must
go! She _shall_ go! It is a wickedness you are doing--do you hear
me, Monseigneur?--a wickedness, a wickedness! But you shall not keep
her here; I will not allow it!"

"Are you stark mad, Dominique Guyon?"

"I will not allow it. I love her, I tell you--there, I have said it!
Listen again, Monseigneur, if you do not understan