Cadillac came forward in welcome. He was always an orator that the Indians themselves envied, and now his rhetoric was as unhampered as though he thought that the prisoner was following each flowing syllable. As he unbound the stiffened arms--they were pitifully thin and small, I thought--he called all mythology to witness his deep regret that this indignity should have been offered to his brother of the white race. I followed him and listened, storing away metaphors even as I carried beads in my cargo. I should need all the eloquence at my command before the close of the summer, and my own tongue was always too direct of speech. Cadillac felt me at his elbow, and when he saw my listening face he stopped to give me a slow wink. "Will monsieur turn pupil to learn swaggering?" he asked, with an upward cock of the eye. "I had thought him too old for a school." I bowed, and hated myself for my lagging wits that would not furnish a retort. "Never too old to sit at your feet," I assured him, and I went away knowing that I had been slow, and that the honors were with him, but knowing, also, that somehow I liked the man, and that I should drink his health when I opened my next tierce of canary. I went to find my men, and it was time that I bestirred myself. License was in order, and the revel assaulted eyes, ears, and nose, till a white man was wise if he forsook his dignity, and ran like a fox to cover. The air was surfeiting with the steam of food. Dog-meat bubbled in great caldrons, and maize cakes crackled on hot stones. A bear had been brought in, and was being hacked in pieces to add to the broth. The women did this, and as I passed them they stopped, with their hands dripping red, and shook their wampum necklaces at me, and pointed meaningly toward a neighboring hut, where I had been told that rum could be bought if you were discreet in choosing your occasion. I tossed them a handful of small coins, and warned them in Huron that if they molested my men I should report them to the commandant. I felt yet more haste to see my canoes under way. I was plunging on in this fashion when Father Carheil plucked at my sleeve. "Do you think you are running from the Iroquois?" he grumbled, and he pushed his irritable, brilliant face close to mine. It was an old face, lined and withered, and the hair above it was scanty and gray, but never have I met a look that showed more fire and unconquerable will. "The commandant wishes you," he went on. "He asked me to fetch you. I should not have complied--it is I who should ask services of him--but I wished to speak to you on my own account. Monsieur, do you know these men that you have in your employ?" I nodded. "As well as I know my own heart. They are my habitants." "Your habitants! Then you have a seigniory? Why do you not stay there as the king wishes?"