"Doby, make your manners," he commanded himself. Off came his cap and he accomplished a bow.
The gentleman turned square upon him. The bold, dark eyes read him through and through.
The boy's face lit up with admiration at the sight of the noble countenance and at the sound of the kind voice saying, "I give you greeting, stranger."
Impulsive Doby had small knowledge of etiquette. Quite carried away by his good luck in meeting this man, he burst out, impetuously, "I do hope that you are Francis Vigo!"
The dark face—haughty and stern—flashed into a quick foreign smile, but the bare right hand gave Doby a good American grip. "From what my first arriving voyageur tells me, I suspect that you are M'sieu Holman, the son," he said.
They gazed at each other as men will who are destined to become friends. Further words were stopped by the sound of a distant chantey, clear and merry.
Forgetting all else, Francis Vigo answered the call of his children by turning his eyes toward the canoes.
Doby slipped unnoticed to a great rock halfway down the bluff. From this vantage he could watch the fleet of voyageurs. Furbished for their entrance to the town, each wore a turban of scarlet bandana and sash of parti-colors. Ear-rings, thumb-rings, metal compasses, were all adangle.
The paddles feathered as they dipped and the jeweled drops sparkled in the light. Purple martins awheel flipped into the eddies of their wake, great bass leaped athwart their bows, and tiny rainbows sprang anew from every disturbance of the water.