“I never forgot you, mademoiselle. You so much resemble Monsieur de la Salle.”
“It is on his account we have run out of the fort to stop you. He does not know you are here. I saw the sentinel close the gate against some one, and afterward your boat pushed out.”
“And did you shake a signal from an upper window in the fort?”
“Monsieur, I could not be sure that you saw it, though I could see your boat.”
“She made it very much her affair,” observed Colin, with the merciless disapproval of a lad. “Monsieur de Tonty, there was no use in her trampling through sand and rain like a Huron witch going to some herb gathering. It was my business to do the errand of my uncle La Salle. When she goes back she will get a lecture and a penance, for all her sixteen years.”
“Mademoiselle,” said Tonty, “I am distressed if my withdrawal from Fort Frontenac causes you trouble. I meant to camp here. I was determined to see Monsieur de la Salle.”
“Monsieur,” courageously replied Barbe, “you cause me no trouble at all. I thought you were returning to your fort on the Illinois. I did not stop to tell my brother, but made him run with me. It is a shame that the enemies of my uncle La Salle hold you out of Fort Frontenac.”
“But very little would you get to eat there,” consoled young Cavelier. “We have had nothing to break our fast on this morning.”