The Hunters of the Hills by Joseph A. Altsheler (best books under 200 pages txt) 📗

found an immaculate white napkin, a large white china plate and goblet, knife, fork and spoon, all of silver, polished to the last degree. Again Robert's nature responded and he looked at himself in his fine dress in the glittering silver of the goblet. Then his right hand stole down and caressed the hilt of his rapier. He felt himself very much of a gentleman, very much of a chevalier, fit to talk on equal terms with St. Luc, de Galisonnière or the best French officer of them all. And Willet, wearing his costly costume with ease, was very much of a gentleman too, and Tayoga, dressed as the forest prince, was in his own way, and quite as good a way, as much of a gentleman as either.

At least a dozen others were in the great room, and many curious eyes were upon the three visitors from the south. It was likely that the presence of such marked figures as theirs would become known quickly in Quebec. They had shown the papers bearing their names at the gate by which they had entered, and doubtless the news of their arrival had been spread at once by the officer in command there. Well, they would prove to the proud chevaliers of Quebec how the Bostonnais could bear themselves, and Robert's pulses leaped.

They were served by an attentive and quiet waiter, and the three, each in his own way, watched everything that was going on. They were aware that not all would be as friendly as de Galisonnière or Father Drouillard, but they were fully prepared to meet a challenge of any kind and uphold the honor of their own people. Robert was hoping that de Galisonnière might come, as he had recommended the inn to them. He did not appear, but the others who did so lingered and young Lennox knew that it was because of the three, who received many hostile glances, although most were intended for the Onondaga. Robert was aware, too, that if the Iroquois had lost this Stadacona of the Mohawks and had been ravaged by Frontenac, they had taken a terrible revenge upon the French and their chief allies, the Hurons. For generations the Hodenosaunee had swept the villages along the St. Lawrence with fire and tomahawk, slaying and capturing their hundreds. But to Tayoga it was and always would be the French who had struck first, and the vital fact remained that they lived upon land upon which the Iroquois themselves had once lived, no man knew how long.

Robert saw that the looks were growing more menacing, although the good
Monsieur Berryer glided among his guests, and counseled caution.

"Take no notice," said Willet in a low tone. "The French are polite, and although they may not like us they will not molest us."

Robert followed his advice. Apparently he had no thought except for his food, which was delicate, but his ears did not miss any sound that could reach them. He understood French well, and he caught several whispers that made the red come to his cheeks. Doubtless they thought he could not speak their language or they would have been more careful.

Half way through the dinner and the door was thrown open, admitting a gorgeous figure and a great gust of words. It was a young man in a brilliant uniform, his hair long, perfumed, powdered and curled, and his face flushed. Robert recognized him at once as that same Count Jean de Mézy who had passed them in the flying carriage. Behind came two officers of about the same age, but of lower rank, seeking his favor and giving him adulation.

His roving eye traveled around the room, and, resting upon the three guests, became inflamed.

"Ah, Nemours, and you, Le Moyne," he said, "look there and behold the two Bostonnais and the Iroquois of whom we have heard, sitting here in our own Inn of the Eagle!"

"But there is no war, not as yet," said Nemours, although he spoke in an obsequious tone.

"But it will come," said de Mézy loudly, "and then, gentlemen, this lordly Quebec of ours, which has known many English captives, will hold multitudes of them."

There were cries of "Silence!" "Not so loud!"

"Don't insult guests!" but de Mézy merely laughed and said: "They don't understand! The slow-witted English never know any tongue but their own."

The red flush in Robert's face deepened and he moved angrily.

"Quiet, boy! Quiet!" whispered the hunter. "He wants a quarrel, and he is surrounded by his friends, while we're strangers in a strange land and a hostile city. Take a trifle of the light white wine that Monsieur Berryer is pouring for you. It won't hurt you."

Robert steadied himself and sipped a little. De Mézy and his satellites, Nemours and Le Moyne, sat down noisily at a table and ordered claret. De Mézy gave the cue. They talked of the Bostonnais, not only of the two Bostonnais who were present, but of the Bostonnais in all the English colonies, applying the word to them whether they came from Massachusetts or New York or Virginia. Robert felt his pulses leaping and the hunter whispered his warning once more.

De Mézy evidently was sincere in his belief that the three understood no French, as he continued to talk freely about the English colonies, the prospect of war, and the superiority of French troops to British or American. Meanwhile he and his two satellites drank freely of the claret and their faces grew more flushed. Robert could stand it no longer.

"Tayoga," he said clearly and in perfect French, "it seems that in
Quebec there are people of loose speech, even as there are in Albany and
New York."

"Our sachems tell us that such is the way of man," said the Onondaga, also in pure French. "Vain boasters dwell too in our own villages. For reasons that I do not know, Manitou has put the foolish as well as the wise into the world."

"To travel, Tayoga, is to find wisdom. We learn what other people know, and we learn to value also the good that we have at home."

"It is so, my friend Lennox. It is only when we go into strange countries and listen to the tongues of the idle and the foolish that we learn the full worth of our own."

"It is not wise, Tayoga, to give a full rein to a loose tongue in a public place."

"Our mothers teach us so, Lennox, as soon as we leave our birch bark cradles."

Willet had raised his hand in warning, but he saw that it was too late.
The young blood in the veins of both Tayoga and Robert was hot, and the
Iroquois was stirred not less deeply than the white man.

"The sachems tell us," he said, "that sometimes a man speaks foolish words because he is born foolish, again he says them at times because his temper or drink makes him foolish, or he may say them because it is his wish to be foolish and he has cultivated foolish ways all his life. This last class is the worst of all, Lennox, my friend, but there is a certain number of them in all lands, as one finds when one travels."

The Onondaga spoke with great clearness and precision in his measured school French and a moment of dead silence followed. Then Robert said:

"It is true, Tayoga. The chiefs of the Hodenosaunee are great and wise men. They have lived and seen much, and seeing they have remembered. They know that speech was given to man in order that he might convey his thoughts to another, and not that he might make a fool of himself."

An angry exclamation came from the table at which de Mézy sat, and his satellites, Nemours and Le Moyne, swept the three with looks meant to be contemptuous. Monsieur Berryer raised deprecating hands and was about to speak, but, probably seeing that both hands and words would be of no avail, moved quietly to one side. He did not like to have quarrels in his excellent Inn of the Eagle, but they were no new thing there, for the gilded youth of Quebec was hot and intemperate.

"But when a man is foolish in our village," resumed Tayoga, "and the words issue from his mouth in a stream like the cackling of a jay bird, the chiefs do not send warriors to punish him, but give him into the hands of the old women, who bind him and beat him with sticks until they can beat sense back into him."

"A good way, Tayoga, a most excellent way," said Robert. "People who have reached the years of maturity pay no attention to the vaporings and madness of the foolish."

He did not look around, but he heard a gusty exclamation, the scrape of a chair on the floor, and a hasty step. Then he felt a hot breath, and, although he did not look up, he knew that de Mézy, flushed with drink and anger, was standing over him. The temperament that nature had given to him, the full strength of which he was only discovering, asserted itself. He too felt wrath inside, but he retained all the presence of mind for which he afterward became famous.

"Shall we go out and see more of the city, Tayoga?" he asked.

"Not until I have had a word with you, young sprig of a Bostonnais," said de Mézy, his florid face now almost a flaming red.

"Your pardon, sir," said Robert, with his uncommon fluency of speech, "I have not the advantage of your acquaintance, which, no doubt, is my loss, as I admit that there are many good and brave men whom I do not know."

"I am Jean de Mézy, a count of France, a captain in the army of King
Louis, and one of the most valued friends of our able Intendant,
François Bigot."

"I have heard of France, of course, I have heard, equally of course, of
His Majesty, King Louis, I have even heard of the Intendant, François
Bigot, but, and sorry I am to say it, I have never heard of the Count
Jean de Mézy."

A low laugh came from a distant corner of the room, and the red of de Mézy's face turned to purple. His hand dropped to the hilt of his sword, but Le Moyne whispered to him and he became more collected.

"In Quebec," he said, throwing back his shoulders and raising his chin, "an officer of His Majesty, King Louis, does not accept an insult. We preserve our honor with the edge of our swords, and for that reason I intend to let a good quantity of the hot blood out of you with mine. There is a good place near the St. Louis gate, and the hour may be as early as you wish."

"He is but a boy," interposed Willet.

"But I know the sword," said Robert, who had made up his mind, and who was measuring his antagonist. "I will meet you tomorrow morning just after sunrise with the small sword, and my seconds will confer with yours tonight."

He stood up that they might see his size. Although only a boy in years, he was as large and strong as de Mézy, and his eyes were clearer and his muscles much firmer. A hum of approval came from the spectators, who now numbered more than a score, but the approval was given for different reasons. Some, and they belonged to the honnêtes gens, were glad to see de Mézy rebuked and hoped that he would be punished; others, the following of Bigot, Cadet, Pean and their corrupt crowd, were eager to see the Bostonnais suffer for his insolence to one of their number. But most of them, both the French of old France and the French of Canada, chivalric of heart, were resolved to see fair play.

Monsieur Berryer shrugged his shoulders, but made no protest. The affair to his mind managed itself very well. There had been none of the violence that he had apprehended. The quarrel evidently was one of gentlemen, carried out in due fashion, and the shedding of blood would occur in the proper place and not in his inn. And yet it would be an advertisement. Men would come to point out where de Mézy had sat, and where the young Bostonnais had sat, and to recount the words that each had said. And then the red wine and the white wine would flow freely. Oh, yes, the affair was managing itself very well indeed, and the thrifty Monsieur Berryer rubbed his hands together with satisfaction.

"We