"By St. Picot!" said he, "I would rather go without dinner for a
month than you should not have asked me, Bigot, to help you out of
this scrape. What if you did lie to that fly-catching beggar at the
Castle of St. Louis, who has not conscience to take a dishonest
stiver from a cheating Albany Dutchman! Where was the harm in it?
Better lie to him than tell the truth to La Pompadour about that
girl! Egad! Madame Fish would serve you as the Iroquois served my
fat clerk at Chouagen--make roast meat of you--if she knew it! Such
a pother about a girl! Damn the women, always, I say, Bigot! A man
is never out of hot water when he has to do with them!"
Striking Bigot's hand hard with his own, he promised; wet or dry,
through flood or fire, to ride with him to Beaumanoir, and take the
girl, or lady,--he begged the Intendant's pardon,--and by such ways
as he alone knew he would, in two days, place her safely among the
Montagnais, and order them at once, without an hour's delay, to pull
up stakes and remove their wigwams to the tuque of the St.
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