In the room without, the envoy from Quebec had stood flicking the dust from his leggings with a scarf.

He was not more than eighteen, his face had scarcely an inkling of moustache, but he had an easy upright carriage, with an air of self-possession, the keenest of grey eyes, a strong pair of shoulders, a look of daring about his rather large mouth, which lent him a manliness well warranting his present service.

He had been left alone, and the first thing he had done was to turn on his heel and examine the place swiftly.

This he seemed to do mechanically, not as one forecasting danger, not as a spy.

In the curve of his lips, in an occasional droop of his eyelids, there was a suggestion of humour: less often a quality of the young than of the old.
For even in the late seventeenth century, youth took itself seriously at times.
Presently, as he stood looking at the sunshine through the open door, a young girl came into the lane of light, waved her hand, with a little laugh, to some one in the distance, and stepped inside.