chaplain being absent in the service of Sieur de la Tour," spoke
Marie, "will monsieur, in his own fashion, bless this meal?"

Father Jogues spread the remnant of his hands, but Antonia did not hear
a word he breathed. She was again in Fort Orange. The Iroquois stalked
up hilly paths and swarmed around the plank huts of Dutch traders. With
the savages walked this very priest, their patient drudge until some of
them blasphemed, when he sternly and fearlessly denounced the sinners.

Supper was scarcely begun when the Swiss lieutenant came again into the
hall and saluted his lady.

"What troubles us, Klussman?" she demanded.

"There is a stranger outside."

"What does he want?"

"Madame, he asks to be admitted to Fort St. John."

"Is he alone? Hath he a suspicious look?"

"No, madame. He bears himself openly and like a man of consequence."

"How many followers has he?"

"A dozen, counting Indians. But all of them he sends back to camp with
our Etchemins."

"And well he may. We want no strange followers in the barracks. Have you
questioned him? Whence does he come?"

"From Fort Orange, in the New Netherlands, madame."

"He is then Hollandais." Marie turned to Antonia Bronck, and was jarred
by her blanching face.

"What is it, Antonia? You have no enemy to follow you into Acadia?"

The flaxen head was shaken for reply.

"But what brings a man from Fort Orange here?"

"There be nearly a hundred men in Fort Orange," whispered Antonia.

"He says," announced the Swiss, "that he is cousin and agent of the
seignior they call the patroon, and his name is Van Corlaer."

"Do you know him, Antonia?"

"Yes."

"And is he kindly disposed to you?"

"He was the friend of my husband, Jonas Bronck," trembled Antonia.

"Admit him," said Marie to her lieutenant.

"Alone, madame?"

"With all his followers, if he wills it. And bring him as quickly as you
can to this table."

"We need Edelwald to manage these affairs," added the lady of the fort,
as her subaltern went out. "The Swiss is faithful, but he has manners as
rugged as his mountains."

IV.

THE WIDOW ANTONIA.

Antonia sat in tense quiet, though whitened even across the lips where
all the color of her face usually appeared; and a stalwart and courtly
man presented himself in the hall. Some of the best blood of the Dutch
Republic had evidently gone to his making. He had the vital and reliable
presence of a master in affairs, and his clean-shav