m's length. Yet, with that eagerness for the fight there was
something else which Carrigan was swift to sense. The attitude of the
watchers was not one of uncertainty or of very great expectation, in
spite of the staring faces and the muscular tightening of the line. He
knew what was passing in their minds and in the low whispers from lip
to lip. They were pitying him. Now that he stood stripped, with only a
few paces between him and the giant figure of St. Pierre, the
unfairness of the fight struck home even to Concombre Bateese. Only
Carrigan himself knew how like tempered steel the sinews of his body
were built. But to the eye, in size alone, he stood like a boy before
St. Pierre. And St. Pierre's people, their voices stilled by the deadly
inequality of it, were waiting for a slaughter and not a fight.

A smile came to Carrigan's lips as he saw Bateese hesitating to drop
the handkerchief, and with the swiftness of the trained fighter he made
his first plan for the battle before the cloth fell from the
half-breed's fingers, As the handkerchief fluttered to the ground, he
faced St. Pierre, the smile gone.

"Never smile when you fight," the greatest of all masters of the ring
had told him. "Never show anger, Don't betray any emotion at all if you
can help it."

Carrigan wondered what the old ring-master would say could he see him
now, backing away slowly from St. Pierre as the giant advanced upon
him, for he knew his face was betraying to St. Pierre and his people
the deadliest of all sins--anxiety and indecision. Very closely, yet
with eyes that seemed to shift uneasily, he watched the effect of his
trick on Boulain. Twice the huge riverman followed him about the ring
of sand, and the steely glitter in his eyes changed to laughter, and
the tense faces of the men about them relaxed. A subdued ripple of
merriment rose where there had been silence. A third time David
maneuvered his retreat, and his eyes shot furtively to Concombre
Bateese and the men at his back. They were grinning. The half-breed's
mouth was wide open, and his grotesque body hung limp and astonished.
This was not a fight! It was a comedy--like a rooster following a
sparrow around a barnyard! And then a still funnier thing happened, for
David began to trot in a circle around St. Pierre, dodging and
feinting, and keeping always at a safe distance. A howl of laughter
came from Bateese and broke in a roar from the men. St. Pierre stopped
in his tracks, a