6/33 His glance was apparently light, but Robert felt when it rested upon him that it was sharp, penetrating and hard to endure. The man behind the leader was swart, short, heavy and of middle years, a Canadian dressed in deerskin and armed with rifle, hatchet and knife. The third man was an Indian, one of the most extraordinary figures that Robert had ever seen. He was of great stature and heavy build, his shoulders and chest immense and covered with knotted muscles, disclosed to the eye, as he was bare to the waist. All the upper part of his body was painted in strange and hideous designs which Robert did not recognize, although he knew the fashions of all the tribes in the New York and St.Lawrence regions. |