The last words drifted away into a whisper, and David was glad that he was not looking into the face of St. Pierre’s wife, for there must have been something there now which it would have been sacrilege for him to stare at, as he was staring at her hair.

No sound of opening door had come from behind them.  Yet St. Pierre had opened it and stood there, watching them with a curious humor in eyes that seemed still to hold a glitter of the fire that had leaped from the half-breed’s flaming birch logs.  His voice was a shock to Carrigan.

“Peste, but you are a gloomy pair!” he boomed.  “Why no light over there in the corner, and why sing that death-song to chase away the devil when there is no devil near?”

Guilt was in David’s heart, but there was no sting of venom in St. Pierre’s words, and he was laughing at them now, as though what he saw were a pretty joke and amused him.

“Late hours and shady bowers!  I say it should be a love song or something livelier,” he cried, closing the door behind him and coming toward them.  “Why not En Roulant ma Boule, my sweet Jeanne?  You know that is my favorite.”

He suddenly interrupted himself, and his voice rolled out in a wild chant that rocked the cabin.

“The wind is fresh, the wind is free, En roulant ma boule!  The wind is fresh—­my love waits me, Rouli, roulant, ma boule roulant!  Behind our house a spring you see, In it three ducks swim merrily, And hunting, the Prince’s son went he, With a silver gun right fair to see—­”

David was conscious that St. Pierre’s wife had risen to her feet, and now she came out of shadow into light, and he was amazed to see that she was laughing back at St. Pierre, and that her two fore-fingers were thrust in her ears to keep out the bellow of her husband’s voice.  She was not at all discomfited by his unexpected appearance, but rather seemed to join in the humor of the thing with St. Pierre, though he fancied he could see something in her face that was forced and uneasy.  He believed that under the surface of her composure she was suffering a distress which she did not reveal.

St. Pierre advanced and carelessly patted her shoulder with one of his big hands, while he spoke to David.

“Has she not the sweetest voice in the world, m’sieu?  Did you ever hear a sweeter or as sweet?  I say it is enough to get down into the soul of a man, unless he is already half dead!  That voice—­”

He caught Marie-Anne’s eyes.  Her cheeks were flaming.  Her look, for an instant, flashed lightning as she halted him.

“Ma foi, I speak it from the heart,” he persisted, with a shrug of his shoulders.  “Am I not right, M’sieu Carrigan?  Did you ever hear a sweeter voice?”

“It is wonderful,” agreed David, wondering if he was hazarding too much.

“Good!  It fills me with happiness to know I am right.  And now, cherie, good-night!  I must return to the raft.”