Sargeant's response to the foregoing injunction certainly served to enlighten his superiors. "I shall not be neglectful," he wrote, "as soon as I can find any man capable and willing to send up into the country with the Indians, to endeavour to penetrate into what the country will and may produce, and to effect their utmost in bringing down the Indians to our factory; but your Honours should give good encouragement to those who undertake such extraordinary service; or else I fear that there will be but few that will embrace such employment."
The rebuke may have been just; but it seems to have given offence to some of the more pompous members of the Company; and Sargeant was desired not to cast any further reflection on his employers in his communications to them. Nevertheless, the Company was soon to learn the value of a less niggardly policy.
Meanwhile for ten days the two ex-employees, Radisson and Groseilliers, gave no further evidence to the English at the new settlement on Nelson River of their presence. But on the tenth day their curiosity and uneasiness regarding the conduct of the English Governor, Bridgar, and the other servants of the Company, had reached such a pitch that it was decided without further consideration that Radisson should start off at once to reconnoitre their behaviour. The actual distance between Fort Bourbon, on the Hays River, and the Company's factory on Nelson River was not above fifty miles; but owing to the dangerous character of the river, and the necessity for delay before an attempt could be made to cross it, Radisson and his party consumed fourteen days on the journey.
Bridgar's credulity.
On their arrival on the 3rd of February, one of the first objects to attract their attention was the Prince Rupert, stuck fast in the ice and mud about a mile from where the factory was being erected. At the same time they met the Governor, who was out on a hunting expedition with the chief mate of the vessel. Satisfying himself that no treachery was intended, Radisson accepted Bridgar's invitation to enter the log-house which he had caused to be built for his own occupation. Radisson introduced one of the Frenchmen who accompanied him as the captain of an imaginary ship, which he averred had arrived from France in his behalf. "Mr. B. believed it and anything else I chose to tell him," remarks Radisson naively, "I aiming always to prevent him from having any knowledge of the English interloper." While engaged in the pleasing diversion of drinking each other's health, a number of musket shots were fired. The crew of the vessel not taking any notice of this, the bushranger concluded that those on board were not on their guard and might readily be surprised.
With this condition uppermost in his mind, the Frenchman quitted Bridgar, having first allayed any suspicion which might have naturally arisen as to the intention of the party. The latter went boldly on board the ship, and no hindrance being offered, their leader had a colloquy with Captain Gillam. The latter, while he received the visit civilly enough, found occasion to let Radisson know that he was far from entirely trusting him. When his visitor suggested that he was running a great risk in allowing the Prince Rupert to remain grounded, Gillam bluntly requested Radisson to mind his own business, adding that he knew perfectly well what he was doing—a boast which, as the sequel showed, was certainly not well founded. Radisson was determined not to be put out of temper, and so run risk of spoiling his plans.
Winter, even in all its rigour, seems to have had no terrors for our indomitable bushranger. For the next two months, as we shall see, he continued to scour backwards and forwards through the country, inspiring his followers and urging them onward to the prosecution of a plan which was obvious to them all. After parting from Gillam the elder, who had not the faintest suspicion that his son was in the locality, Radisson at once started to parley with Gillam, the younger.
When he had regained the island which he had left, he was instantly made aware that the New Englanders had been considerably less idle than the Company's servants; having completed a very creditable fort and mounted it with six pieces of cannon. With Benjamin Gillam, our bushranger passed off the same subterfuge with which he had hoodwinked Zachary. He spoke fluently of his newly arrived ship and her cargo and crew, and to cap his narrative, proceeded to introduce her captain, who was none other than the old pilot, Pierre Allemand, who, from the description still extant of his appearance, looked every inch the bold, fierce and uncompromising mariner. He had a great deal to tell Benjamin likewise of the Company's post near by, which he said contained forty soldiers.
"Let them be forty devils," exclaimed Gillam, junior, "we have built a good fort and are afraid of nothing."
Whereupon Radisson gently reminded him that according to his agreement he was to have built no fort whatever. In reply to this Benjamin begged his visitor not to take umbrage at such a matter, as he never intended to dispute the rights of the French in the region; and the fort was merely intended as a defence against the Indians.