Conjurors House | Page 5

look fade into pleased surprise. Instantly his hat swept
the gunwale of the canoe. He stepped magnificently ashore. The crisis
was over. Not a word had been spoken.

Chapter Three
Galen Albret sat in his rough-hewn arm-chair at the head of the table,
receiving the reports of his captains. The long, narrow room opened
before him, heavy raftered, massive, white, with a cavernous fireplace
at either end. Above him frowned Sir George's portrait, at his right
hand and his left stretched the row of home-made heavy chairs,
finished smooth and dull by two centuries of use.
His arms were laid along the arms of his seat; his shaggy head was
sunk forward until his beard swept the curve of his big chest; the heavy
tufts of hair above his eyes were drawn steadily together in a frown of
attention. One after another the men arose and spoke. He made no
movement, gave no sign, his short, powerful form blotted against the
lighter silhouette of his chair, only his eyes and the white of his beard
gleaming out of the dusk.
Kern of Old Brunswick House, Achard of New; Ki-wa-nee, the Indian
of Flying Post--these and others told briefly of many things, each in his
own language. To all Galen Albret listened in silence. Finally Louis
Placide from the post at Kettle Portage got to his feet. He too reported
of the trade,--so many "beaver" of tobacco, of powder, of lead, of pork,
of flour, of tea, given in exchange; so many mink, otter, beaver, ermine,

marten, and fisher pelts taken in return. Then he paused and went on at
greater length in regard to the stranger, speaking evenly but with
emphasis. When he had finished, Galen Albret struck a bell at his
elbow. Me-en-gan, the bowsman of the Factor's canoe, entered,
followed closely by the young man who had that afternoon arrived.
He was dressed still in his costume of the voyageur--the loose blouse
shirt, the buckskin leggings and moccasins, the long tasselled red sash.
His head was as high and his glance as free, but now the steel blue of
his eye had become steady and wary, and two faint lines had traced
themselves between his brows. At his entrance a hush of expectation
fell. Galen Albret did not stir, but the others hitched nearer the long,
narrow table, and two or three leaned both elbows on it the better to
catch what should ensue.
Me-en-gan stopped by the door, but the stranger walked steadily the
length of the room until he faced the Factor. Then he paused and waited
collectedly for the other to speak.
This the Factor did not at once begin to do, but sat
impassive--apparently without thought--while the heavy breathing of
the men in the room marked off the seconds of time. Finally abruptly
Galen Albret's cavernous voice boomed forth. Something there was
strangely mysterious, cryptic, in the virile tones issuing from a bulk so
massive and inert. Galen Albret did not move, did not even raise the
heavy-lidded, dull stare of his eyes to the young man who stood before
him; hardly did his broad arched chest seem to rise and fall with the
respiration of speech; and yet each separate word leaped forth alive,
instinct with authority.
"Once at Leftfoot Lake, two Indians caught you asleep," he pronounced.
"They took your pelts and arms, and escorted you to Sudbury. They
were my Indians. Once on the upper Abítibi you were stopped by a
man named Herbert, who warned you from the country, after relieving
you of your entire outfit. He told you on parting what you might expect
if you should repeat the attempt--severe measures, the severest. Herbert
was my man. Now Louis Placide surprises you in a rapids near Kettle
Portage and brings you here."

During the slow delivering of these accurately spaced words, the
attitude of the men about the long, narrow table gradually changed.
Their curiosity had been great before, but now their intellectual interest
was awakened, for these were facts of which Louis Placide's statement
had given no inkling. Before them, for the dealing, was a problem of
the sort whose solution had earned for Galen Albret a reputation in the
north country. They glanced at one another to obtain the sympathy of
attention, then back toward their chief in anxious expectation of his
next words. The stranger, however, remained unmoved. A faint smile
had sketched the outline of his lips when first the Factor began to speak.
This smile he maintained to the end. As the older man paused, he
shrugged his shoulders.
"All of that is quite true," he admitted.
Even the unimaginative men of the Silent Places started at these simple
words, and vouchsafed to their speaker a more sympathetic attention.
For the tones in which they