"You attach unnecessary importance to your wanderings, Master Ormerod," he reproved me. "Here, sir, we have work sufficient to occupy us for many generations. The—ah—failures of my predecessor, I venture to assert, may be ascribed to his unfortunate predilection to extravagant views and policies. The day for such delusions, I assure you, is past. Here in New York we are now occupied with the important task of improving the lot of our loyal, law-abiding citizens, and the abatement of hindrances to trade and commerce."
He selected a paper from several on the table before him.
"I have here a draft of a new charter I am issuing to the citizens! Too little attention has been paid to such matters, and it shall be my care to——"
"Do I understand you have no ear for my report, your Excellency?" I broke in.
"Some other time, Master Ormerod. At the present, I am occupied with affairs of serious moment."
"But the French——"
"Tut, tut, sir," he remonstrated severely. "Here is overmuch stress upon the French. Another fault of my—ah—distinguished predecessor was to exaggerate the animosity of the French. Treat the French fairly, live and let live, so you may construe my policy. I have no fault to find with French expansion. There is land enough for all on this continent. As for the near-by savages, we have humored them more than is good for them. In future——"
How I got from that room I do not remember, but in some way I dammed the flow of pompous rhetoric and futile reasoning, brushed by all who would have questioned me in the fort, and found my way by oft-trodden paths into Pearl Street. I was still seething with indignation as the red-brick house came in view. When I tapped at the door none answered me, so I pushed it open and entered the wide hallway. I called, but no answer was returned. And then I heard a bubbling chuckle of mirth in the rear garden, capped by Corlaer's squeaking laughter.
It was as if a secret hammer tapped at my heart. I caught my breath, and stepped softly through the corridor to the door which gave on the garden. On the steps below me sat stout Scots Elspeth, heedless of the snow, and John Allen, both of them helpless with laughter; and in the garden's center a small, lusty urchin in breeches, a wooden scalping knife clutched in one mitten-covered fist, circled cautiously the ponderous figure of Corlaer, who contrived a most realistic mimicry of panic-fear.
"And now I shall scalp you!" the urchin shrieked gleefully.