face changing from red
to white as the different emotions were awakened; his white teeth
crushing his lips. Sir John Penwick had left England, taking all his
worldly goods--which were of no mean value--with him. He settled his
possessions in the New World. These in time became very great and he
was known as one of the wealthiest men in the locality in which he
lived. After six years of married life, a great grief came upon him;
his wife died, leaving him a baby girl of five. This so unsettled
him--having loved his wife beyond measure--he turned again to warfare,
having interest and inclination for naught else. He sent his baby
daughter with her nurse, Janet Wadham, to the Ursuline Convent
at Quebec, where they remained until coming to England. Sir John
travelled about from one country to another, engaging in all kinds of
intrigue and war. One Jean La Fosse--a Jesuit priest--had been for
many years the tried and true friend of Sir John, having been in his
early years a suitor to Lady Penwick. This friendship had grown so
stout that when they met again in the New World, Sir John put his
possessions, in trust, into La Fosse's keeping. When Sir John was
taken prisoner, a sort of treaty had been entered into between the
French and English, and hostages were required for prisoners of
importance. La Fosse was now holding high office in the ranks of his
adopted country--England. Therefore, when hostage was asked by the
English for Sir John Penwick, La Fosse saw the chance he had waited
for for years, and his John was every inch an Englishman, and since
being prisoner of the French, determined as far as possible to place
his belongings with his own country. He had thought it all out and
wrote his desires to La Fosse. Of course, what belonged to Sir John
belonged to England, but his possessions were on French soil and his
daughter in a French convent. And now Sir John felt 'twould be an
opportunity to place his child forever in the hands of his own
country. La Fosse had so shaped affairs, that Sir John was at his
mercy, and at Sir John's proposal that his child should be held as
hostage for himself, he had answered that the babe was of too tender
years to be accepted unless accompanied by lands, tenements and
hereditaments. This was a happy thought to Sir John, and his old trust
of La Fosse came back. "After all," he thought, "the French would
rather give up my child than a man, but my possessions they would
never give." So, not