"He was a fiend, this Roger Audemard," he began. "A devil in man
shape, afterward called 'Black Roger' because of the color of his
soul."
Then he went on. He described Hatchet River Post, where the
tragedy had happened; then told of the fight that came about one
day between Roger Audemard and the factor of the post and his two
sons. It was an unfair fight; he conceded that--three to one was
cowardly in a fight. But it could not excuse what happened
afterward. Audemard was beaten. He crept off into the forest,
almost dead. Then he came back one stormy night in the winter with
three strange friends. Who the friends were the Police never
learned. There was a fight, but all through the fight Black Roger
Audemard cried out not to kill the factor and his sons. In spite
of that one of the sons was killed. Then the terrible thing
happened. The father and his remaining son were bound hand and
foot and fastened in the ancient dungeon room under the Post
building. Then Black Roger set the building on fire, and stood
outside in the storm and laughed like a madman at the dying
shrieks of his victims. It was the season when the trappers were
on their lines, and there were but few people at the post.
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