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Surely you will not miss it, my friend?" "I am going by way of Post Lac Bain," replied Reese Beaudin equivocally. But his mind was not on the sale of dogs. From his pipe he puffed out thick clouds of smoke, and his eyes narrowed until they seemed like coals peering out of cracks; and he said, in his quiet, soft voice: "Do you know of a man named Jacques Dupont, m'sieu?"
You are tired, m'sieu, that is your bunk." Reese Beaudin held out a hand. The bulk of the two stood out in the lamp-glow, and Joe Delesse was so much the bigger man that his hand was half again the size of Reese Beaudin's. They gripped. And then a strange look went over the face of Joe Delesse. A cry came from out of his beard. His mouth grew twisted.
I half killed Beaudin, the Government mail-runner, because he insulted another man's wife when that man my friend was away. Then Beaudin, seeing his chance, robbed the mail himself, and the crime was laid to me. Well, I got even, and stuck up a mail-sledge myself but I guess there was a good reason for it.
"Like the Yellow-back she never returned," breathed Reese Beaudin. "Never. And now it is strange " "What is strange, Joe Delesse?" "That for the first time in all these years she is going to Lac Bain to the dog sale." Reese Beaudin's face was again hidden in the smoke of his pipe. Through it his voice came. "It is a cold night, M'sieu Delesse. Hear the wind howl!"
For an instant it seemed as though Reese Beaudin had stood to meet that fatal rush, but in that same instant so swiftly that only the hooded stranger knew what had happened he was out of the way, and his left arm seemed to shoot downward, and then up, and then his right straight out, and then again his left arm downward, and up and it was the third blow, all swift as lightning, that brought a yell from the hooded stranger.
I will search this this Reese Beaudin, as he calls himself! And if there is to be a fight, let it be a good one. Strip yourself to that great garment you have on, friend Dupont. See, our friend this Reese Beaudin is already stripping!" He was unbuttoning the giant's heavy Hudson's Bay coat. He pulled it off, and drew Dupont's knife from its sheath.
He tucked the violin in its buckskin covering under his arm. From the table he took his cap and placed it on his head. In a last effort McDougall sprang from his chair and caught the other's arm. "Reese Beaudin you are going to your death! As factor of Lac Bain agent of justice under power of the Police I forbid it!" "So-o-o-o," spoke Reese Beaudin gently. "Mon pere "
Steel clinked in his hands. And Jacques Dupont, terror in his heart, was trying to see as he groped to his knees. The steel snapped over his wrists. And then he heard a voice close over him. It was the voice of Reese Beaudin. "And this is your final punishment, Jacques Dupont to be hanged by the neck until you are dead.
"His fist is like a wood-sledge, m'sieu." "So it was years ago." "His forearm is as big as the calf of your leg." "Oui, friend Delesse, it is the forearm of a giant." "He is half again your weight." "Or more, friend Delesse." "He will kill you! As the great God lives, he will kill you!" "I shall die hard," repeated Reese Beaudin for the third time that day. Joe Delesse turned slowly, doggedly.
Joe Delesse had been watching the factor's house, and he worked his way slowly along the edge of the feasters so that he might casually come into the path of Reese Beaudin. And there was one other man who also had watched, and who came in the same direction. He was a stranger, tall, closely hooded, his mustached face an Indian bronze.
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