“Because I spoke at that council.”
“You spoke––but you were a prisoner, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
The Lieutenant sat staring into the fire. Slowly it came to him what it was that the Captain had accomplished.
“Why, Menard,” he said, “New France won’t be able to hold you, when this gets out. How you must have gone at them. You’ll be 369 a major in a week. You’re the luckiest man this side of Versailles.”
“No, I’m not. And I won’t be a major. I’m not on the Governor’s pocket list. But I don’t care about that. That isn’t the reason I did it.”
“Why did you do it then?”
“I––That’s the question I’ve been asking myself for several days, Du Peron.”
The Lieutenant was too thoroughly aroused to note the change in the Captain’s tone.
“You don’t see it right now, Menard. Wait till you’ve reached the city, and got into some clothes and a good bed, and can shake hands with d’Orvilliers and Provost and the general staff,––maybe with the Governor himself. Then you’ll feel different. You’re down now. I know how it feels. You’re all tired out, and you’ve got the Onondaga dirt rubbed on so thick that you’re lost in it. You wait a few weeks.”