He was not afraid of the river bottom.
He was thinking again of Marie-Anne.
The scraping of a canoe against the side of the bateau recalled
him suddenly to the moment at hand. He heard low voices, and one
of them, he knew, was St. Pierre's. For an interval the voices
continued, frequently so low that he could not distinguish them at
all. For ten minutes he waited impatiently. Then the door swung
open, and St. Pierre came in.
Slowly and coolly David rose to meet him, and at the same moment
the chief of the Boulains closed the door behind him. There was no
greeting in Carrigan's manner. He was the Law, waiting, unexcited,
sure of himself, impassive as a thing of steel. He was ready to
fight. He expected to fight. It only remained for St. Pierre to
show what sort of fight it was to be. And he was amazed at St.
Pierre, without betraying that amazement. In the vivid light that
shot through the western windows the chief of the Boulains stood
looking at David. He wore a gray flannel shirt open at the throat,
and it was a splendid throat David saw, and a splendid head above
it, with its reddish beard and hair. But what he saw chiefly were
St.
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