in
this last half hour in the cabin. He had offered to Pierre's wife a
friendship which he had no right to offer and which she knew he had no
right to offer. He was the Law. And she, like Roger Audemard, was a
criminal. Her quick woman's instinct had told her there could be no
distinction between them, unless there was a reason. And now Carrigan
confessed to himself that there had been a reason. That reason had come
to him with the first glimpse of her as he lay in the hot sand. He had
fought against it in the canoe; it had mastered him in those thrilling
moments when he had beheld this slim, beautiful creature riding
fearlessly into the boiling waters of the Holy Ghost. Her eyes, her
hair, the sweet, low voice that had been with him in his fever, had
become a definite and unalterable part of him. And this must have shown
in his eyes and face when he dropped his hand--when she told him she
was St. Pierre's wife.

And now she was afraid of him! She was regretting that she had not left
him to die. She had misunderstood what she had seen betraying itself
during those few seconds of his proffered friendship. She saw only a
man whom she had nearly killed, a man who represented the Law, a man
whose power held her in the hollow of his hand. And she had stepped
back from him, startled, and had told him that she was not St. Pierre's
daughter, but his wife!

In the science of criminal analysis Carrigan always placed himself in
the position of the other man. And he was beginning to see the present
situation from the view-point of Jeanne Marie-Anne Boulain. He was
satisfied that she had made a desperate mistake and that until the last
moment she had believed it was another man behind the rock. Yet she had
shown no inclination to explain away her error. She had definitely
refused to make an explanation. And it was simply a matter of common
sense to concede that there must be a powerful motive for her refusal.
There was but one conclusion for him to arrive at--the error which St.
Pierre's wife had made in shooting the wrong man was less important to
her than keeping the secret of why she had wanted to kill some other
man.

David was not unconscious of the breach in his own armor. He had
weakened, just as the Superintendent of "N" Division had weakened that
day four years ago when they had almost quarreled over Carmin Fanchet.

"I'll swear to Heaven she isn't bad, no matter what her brother has
been," McVane had said. "I'll gamb