CHAPTER XIV.
THE OTHER WOMAN The world is the book of women .-- _Rousseau_.
I needed not to be advised that presently there would be a meeting of some of the leading men of the Hudson Bay Company at the little gray stone, dormer-windowed building on Notre Dame Street.

In this old building--in whose vaults at one time of emergency was stored the entire currency of the Canadian treasury--there still remained some government records, and now under the steep-pitched roof affairs were to be transacted somewhat larger than the dimensions of the building might have suggested.

The keeper of my inn freely made me a list of those who would be present--a list embracing so many scores of prominent men whom he then swore to be in the city of Montreal that, had the old Chateau Ramezay afforded twice its room, they could not all have been accommodated.

For myself, it was out of the question to gain admittance.
In those days all Montreal was iron-shuttered after nightfall, resembling a series of jails; and to-night it seemed doubly screened and guarded.

None the less, late in the evening, I allowed seeming accident to lead me in a certain direction.