Chapter IX. The Sign of the Bear

Robert returned with Langlade to the partisan's camp at the edge of the forest adjoining that of the main French army, where the Indian warriors had lighted fires and were cooking steaks of the deer. He was disposed to be silent, but Langlade as usual chattered volubly, discoursing of French might and glory, but saying nothing that would indicate to his prisoner the meaning of the present military array in the forest.

Robert did not hear more than half of the Owl's words, because he was absorbed in those of Montcalm, which still lingered in his mind. Why should the Marquis wish to send him to France, and to have him treated, when he was there, more as a guest than as a prisoner? Think as he would he could find no answer to the question, but the Owl evidently had been impressed by his reception from Montcalm, as he treated him now with distinguished courtesy. He also seemed particularly anxious to have the good opinion of the lad who had been so long his prisoner.

"Have I been harsh to you?" he asked with a trace of anxiety in his tone. "Have I not always borne myself toward you as if you were an important prisoner of war? It is true I set the Dove as an invincible sentinel over you, but as a good soldier and loyal son of France I could do no less. Now, I ask you, Monsieur Robert Lennox, have not I, Charles Langlade, conducted myself as a fair and considerate enemy?"

"If I were to escape and be captured again, Captain Langlade, it is my sincere wish that you should be my captor the second time, even as you were the first."

The Owl was gratified, visibly and much, and then he announced a visitor. Robert sprang to his feet as he saw St. Luc approaching, and his heart throbbed as always when he was in the presence of this man. The chevalier was in a splendid uniform of white and silver unstained by the forest. His thick, fair hair was clubbed in a queue and powdered neatly, and a small sword, gold hilted, hung at his belt. He was the finest and most gallant figure that Robert had yet seen in the wilderness, the very spirit and essence of that brave and romantic France with which England and her colonies were fighting a duel to the death. And yet St. Luc always seemed to him too the soul of knightly chivalry, one to whom it was impossible for him to bear any hostility that was not merely official. His own hand went forward to meet the extended hand of the chevalier.

"We seem destined to meet many times, Mr. Lennox," said St. Luc, "in battle, and even under more pleasant conditions. I had heard that you were the prisoner of our great forest ranger, Captain Langlade, and that you would be received by our commander-in-chief, the Marquis de Montcalm."

"He made me a most extraordinary offer, that I go as a prisoner of war to Paris, but almost in the state of a guest."

"And you thought fit to decline, which was