ain' gwine ma'hy nobody ef he ain' 'bleeged, suh. He
dess lak all de young gentry, suh--'scusin' you'se'f, Mars' Carus."

I nodded in grim silence. After a moment I asked him to open the door
for me, but he shook his aged head, saying: "Ef a ossifer done tell you
what de Kunnel done tell me, what you gwine do, Mars' Carus, suh?"

"Obey," I said briefly. "You're a good servant, Joshua. When Colonel
Van Schaick returns, say to him that Captain Renault of the Rangers
marches to Butlersbury at sunup, and that if Colonel Van Schaick can
spare six bat-horses and an army transport-wagon, to be at the
Half-Moon at dawn, Captain Renault will be vastly obliged to him, and
will certainly render a strict accounting to the proper authorities."

Then I turned, descended the brick stoop, and walked slowly back to my
quarters, a prey to apprehension and bitter melancholy. For if it were
true that Walter Butler had done this thing, the law of the land was on
his side; and if the war ended with him still alive, the courts must
sustain him in this monstrous claim on Elsin Grey. Thought halted. Was
it possible that Walter Butler had dared invade the tiger-brood of
Catrine Montour to satisfy his unslaked lust?

Was it possible that he dared affront the she-demon of Catherinestown
by ignoring an alliance with her fiercely beautiful child?--an alliance
that Catrine Montour must have considered legal and binding, however
irregular it might appear to jurists.

I was astounded. Where passion led this libertine, nothing barred his
way--neither fear nor pity. And he had even dared to reckon with this
frightful hag, Catrine Montour--this devil's spawn of Frontenac--and
her tawny offspring.

I had seen the girl, Carolyn, at Guy Park--a splendid young animal, of
sixteen then, darkly beautiful, wild as a forest-cat. No wonder the
beast in him had bristled at view of her; no wonder the fierce passion
in her had leaped responsive to his forest courtship. By heaven, a
proper mating in the shaggy hills of Danascara! Yes, but when the male
beast emerges, yellow eyes fixed on the dead line that should bar him
from the haunts of men, then, _then_ it is time that a man shall arise
and stand against him--stand for honor and right and light, and drive
him back to the darkness of his lair again, or slay him at the sunlit
gates of that civilization he dared to challenge.

CHAPTER X

SERMONS IN STONES

By sunup we had left the city on the three