Lazenby admired Pierre; said he was good stuff, and voted him amusing,
with an ingenious emphasis of heathen oaths; but advised him, as only an
insolent young scoundrel can, to forswear securing, by the seductive game
of poker or euchre, larger interest on his capital than the H. B. C.;
whose record, he insisted, should never be rivalled by any single man in
any single lifetime. Then he incidentally remarked that he would like to
empty the Company's cash-box once--only once;--thus reconciling the
preacher and the sinner, as many another has done. Lazenby's morals were
not bad, however. He was simply fond of making them appear terrible;
even when in London he was more idle than wicked. He gravely suggested
at last, as a kind of climax, that he and Pierre should go out on the pad
together. This was a mere stroke of pleasantry on his part, because, the
most he could loot in that far North were furs and caches of buffalo
meat; and a man's capacity and use for them were limited. Even Pierre's
especial faculty and art seemed valueless so far Polewards; but he had
his beat throughout the land, and he kept it like a perfect patrolman.
He had not been at Fort Luke for years, and he would not be there again
for more years; but it was certain that he would go on reappearing till
he vanished utterly. At the end of the first week of this visit at Fort
Luke, so completely had he conquered the place, that he had won from the
Chief Factor the year's purchases of skins, the stores, and the Fort
itself; and every stitch of clothing owned by Lazenby: so that, if he had
insisted on the redemption of the debts, the H. B. C. and Lazenby had
been naked and hungry in the wilderness. But Pierre was not a hard
creditor. He instantly and nonchalantly said that the Fort would be
useless to him, and handed it back again with all therein, on a most
humorously constructed ninety-nine years' lease; while Lazenby was left
in pawn. Yet Lazenby's mind was not at certain ease; he had a wholesome
respect for Pierre's singularities, and dreaded being suddenly called
upon to pay his debt before he could get his new clothes made, maybe, in