He awoke with that dream a thing of fire in his brain.  The sun was not yet up, but the flush of it was painting the east, and he dressed quietly and carefully, listening for some sound of awakening beyond the bulkhead.  If Marie-Anne was awake, she was very still.  There was noise ashore.  Across the river he could hear the singing of men, and through his window saw the white smoke of early fires rising above the tree-tops.  It was the Indian who unlocked the door and brought in his breakfast, and it was the Indian who returned for the dishes half an hour later.

After that Carrigan waited, tense with the desire for action to begin.  He sensed no premonition of evil about to befall him.  Every nerve and sinew in his body was alive for the combat.  He thrilled with an overwhelming confidence, a conviction of his ability to win, an almost dangerous, self-conviction of approaching triumph in spite of the odds in weight and brute strength which were pitted against him.  A dozen times he listened at the bulkhead between him and Marie-Anne, and still he heard no movement on the other side.

It was eight o’clock when one of the bateau men appeared at the door and asked if he was ready.  Quickly David joined him.  He forgot his taunts to Concombre Bateese, forgot the softly padded gloves in his pack with which he had promised to pommel the half-breed into oblivion.  He was thinking only of naked fists.

Into a canoe he followed the bateau man, who turned his craft swiftly in the direction of the opposite shore.  And as they went, David was sure he caught the slight movement of a curtain at the little window of Marie-Anne’s forward cabin.  He smiled back and raised his hand, and at that the curtain was drawn back entirely, and he knew that St. Pierre’s wife was watching him as he went to the fight.

The raft was deserted, but a little below it, on a wide strip of beach made hard and smooth by flood water, had gathered a crowd of men.  It seemed odd to David they should remain so quiet, when he knew the natural instinct of the riverman was to voice his emotion at the top of his lungs.  He spoke of this to the bateau man, who shrugged his shoulders and grinned.

“Eet ees ze command of St. Pierre,” he explained.  “St. Pierre say no man make beeg noise at—­what you call heem—­funeral?  An’ theese goin’ to be wan gran’ fun-e-RAL, m’sieu!”

“I see,” David nodded.  He did not grin back at the other’s humor.

He was looking at the crowd.  A giant figure had appeared out of the center of it and was coming slowly down to the river.  It was St. Pierre.  Scarcely had the prow of the canoe touched shore when David leaped out and hurried to meet him.  Behind St. Pierre came Bateese, the half-breed.  He was stripped to the waist and naked from the knees down.  His gorilla-like arms hung huge and loose at his sides, and the muscles of his hulking body stood out like carven mahogany in the glisten of the morning sun.  He was like a grizzly, a human beast of monstrous power, something to look at, to back away from, to fear.