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Updated: June 25, 2025
Here he posted himself in the doorway with his sword jammed above the hinge. His man made a precipitate rush to heap fires for our refreshment, dropping three logs across the fort gates and two more athwart the door of the house. Then Godefroy whistled. Like wolves out of the earth rose M. Radisson and his five men from the shore near the gates.
"What sort of weather this morning?" demanded M. Godefroy curtly, as he buttoned his undervest of gray swandown upon a stomach that was already a little too prominent. "Very cold, sir," replied Charles meekly. "At six o'clock the thermometer marked seven degrees above zero. But, as you will see, sir, the sky is quite clear, and I think we are going to have a fine morning."
The fellow rolled lazily over, got to his knees, and stood up. Pushing the wizard aside, this Indian faced the audience. It was Le Borgne, his foxy eye yellow as flame, teeth snapping, and a tongue running at such a pace that we could scarce make out a word of his jargon. "What does he say, Godefroy?" "Sit down," whispered the trader, "you are safe."
"Now they'll set us free for fear of M. Radisson, and we'll come back for you." But Godefroy had miscalculated the effects of his threats. At the door stood a score of warriors who had not been to the massacre. If we hoped to escape torture the wizard bade us follow these men. They led us away with a sinister silence.
"By the saints," says he softly, "a man loses the Christian calendar in this land! 'Tis All Souls' Night! Give the men a treat, La Chesnaye." But La Chesnaye, being governor, must needs show his authority, and vows to flog the knave for impudence. Turning over benches in his haste, the merchant falls on Godefroy with such largesse of cuffs that the fellow is glad to keep peace.
But as well talk to tigers. Le Borgne alone listened, his foxy glance fastened on my face with a strange, watchful look, neither hostile nor friendly. To Godefroy's threats the Indian answered that "white-man talk not true of all," pointing to Jack Battle, "him no friend great white chief him captive " Then Godefroy burst out with the unworthiest answer that ever passed man's lips.
Godefroy opposing to them the French King's possession of the precedency, Grotius, like a zealous Minister of Sweden, maintained, that that title could only serve against such as had never disputed it; that in former times the Kings of Sweden had no transactions of this kind but in the North, where they never yielded the precedency to any person; and that since they had affairs with France, they always treated upon an equality.
"He says he doesn't understand the white-man's tongue which is a lie," added Godefroy of his own account. "Le Borgne was interpreter for the Fur Company at the south of the bay the year that M. Radisson left the English." Were my assailants, then, Hudson's Bay Company men come up from the south end of James Bay? Certainly, the voice had spoken English.
His entire lack of tact and refinement was painful to his young wife, whose tenderest feelings he ruthlessly and thoughtlessly trampled upon. Things were looking unpromising, when, happily for her, Madame Godefroy died in giving birth to her firstborn. When he spoke of his deceased wife, the banker waxed poetical, although had she lived they would have been divorced in six months.
"Now, remember, my brave lads," said he, after he had outlined his plans, drawing figures of fort and ship and army of seven on the snow, "now, remember, if you do what I've told you, not a shot will be fired, not a drop of blood spilled, not a grain of powder used, and to every man free tobacco for the winter " "If we succeed," interjects Godefroy sullenly.
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