company.

"The crafty old Hollandais!" thought Marie. "He was cunning in his
knowledge of Antonia. But he hath made up this fist at a younger
Hollandais who will scarce stop for dead hands."

The Dutch gentlewoman snuffed both waxlights. Her lips were drawn in
grieved lines. Marie glanced up at one of the portraits on the wall, and
said:--

"The agonies which men inflict on the beings they love best, must work
perpetual astonishment in heaven. Look at the Sieur Claude de la Tour, a
noble of France who could stoop to become the first English knight of
Acadia, forcing his own son to take up arms against him."

The elder La Tour frowned and flickered in his frame.

"Yet he had a gracious presence," said Antonia. "Lady Dorinda says he
was the handsomest man at the English court."

"I doubt it not; the La Tours are a beautiful race. And it was that very
graciousness which made him a weak prisoner in the hands of the English.
They married him to one of the queen's ladies, and granted him all
Acadia, which he had only to demand from his son, if he would turn it
over to England and declare himself an English subject I can yet see his
ships as they rounded Cape Sable; and the face of my lord when he read
his father's summons to surrender the claims of France. We were to be
loaded with honors. France had driven us out on account of our faith;
England opened her arms. We should be enriched, and live forever a happy
and united family, sole lords of Acadia."

Marie broke off another thread.

"The king of France, who has outlawed my husband and delivered him to
his enemy, should have seen him then, Antonia. Sieur Claude La Tour put
both arms around him and pleaded. It was, 'My little Charles, do not
disgrace me by refusal;' and 'My father, I love you, but here I
represent the rights of France.' 'The king of France is no friend of
ours,' says Sieur Claude. 'Whether he rewards or punishes me,' says
Charles, 'this province belongs to my country, and I will hold it while
I have life to defend it.' And he was obliged to turn his cannon against
His own father; and the ships were disabled and driven off."

"Was the old mynheer killed?"

"His pride was killed. He could never hold up his head in England again,
and he had betrayed France. My lord built him a house outside our fort,
yet neither could he endure Acadia. He died in England. You know I
brought his widow thence with me last year. She should have her dower of
lands here,