It seemed, for a time, that they
had forgotten St. Pierre. They did not speak of him. Twice they
saw Andre, the Broken Man, but the name of Roger Audemard was not
spoken. And a little at a time she told him of the hidden paradise
of the Boulains away up in the unmapped wildernesses of the
Yellowknife beyond the Great Bear, and of the great log chateau
that was her home.
A part of the afternoon he spent on shore. He filled a moosehide
bag full of sand and suspended it from the limb of a tree, and for
three-quarters of an hour pommeled it with his fists, much to the
curiosity and amusement of St. Pierre's men, who could see nothing
of man-fighting in these antics. But the exercise assured David
that he had lost but little of his strength and that he would be
in form to meet Bateese when the time came. Toward evening Marie-
Anne joined him, and they walked for half an hour up and down the
beach. It was Bateese who got supper. And after that Carrigan sat
with Marie-Anne on the foredeck of the barge and smoked another of
St. Pierre's cigars.
The camp of the rivermen was two hundred yards below the bateau,
screened between by a finger of hardwood, so that except when they
broke into a chorus of laughter or strengthened their throats with
snatches of song, there was no sound of their voices.
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