A perplexed look crossed his
swarthy face as he entered the dock
and faced his accusers. His deerskin
trousers belted with a gaudy L-As-
sumption sash, with lank locks falling
about his shoulders, he cast quick,
bird-like and anxious glances about
him. Why, he wondered, should be, a
poor bush Indian, be the centre of all
this fuss and pageantry . . . of all this
attention from these rich men garbed
in scarlet coats and flowing silk? At
times his dark eyes took on a haunted
look then, as he observed his red-
coated guards, his features would
light up with a smile. He would be
all right as long as his friends, the
Mounted Police, were beside him!

Never had lonely Fort Providence
witnessed such a colorful scene as that
now enacted beneath the darkened
beams of the Mission. At a long pine
table draped with a scarlet flag sat
Inspector Fletcher in dress uniform
of blue, Judge Dubuc in wig and
gown, and, like birds of ill-omen, two
black-gowned attorneys. Before the
bronzed jury of trappers, traders, and
white-collared clerks of the fur com-
pany, brought 400 miles aboard the
steamer, stood a swarthy interpreter,
nervously fingering the brim of his
cowboy hat.

Dramatic Evidence

Day after day, under the slanting
rays of the midnight sun, the trial
went on, and there seemed little
doubt but that Albert’s innocence
would be established. Then, into the
witness-box stepped the lean, sardonic-
faced sergeant, “Nitchie”’ Thorne.
With knitted brow he told of finding
the squaw covered with a blanket, a
discharged gun pointing towards her.
Suddenly the courtroom tensed as
Thorne went on. There was a bullet
hole in the squaw’s forehead but no
corresponding hole in the blanket
covering her head. Therefore the
blanket must have been pulled over
her after death, and by none other
than her husband, Albert Lebeaux.
The whole set-up was a fake. The
woman,’ he insisted dramatically,
“had been killed—not by a gun-shot
but by a blow on the head! After-
wards she had been carried to the
spot where I found her, and every-
thing fixed up to make it look as
though she'd killed herself.”

The sensation caused by this dis-
closure was heightened as Doctor Mac-
Donald gave evidence. The woman’s

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Albert Lebeaux and his wife, taken at the H.B.C. post at Fort Providence only six months
before the tragedy mentioned in the story.

skull, he stated, had been smashed by
a heavy blow, and added that the
bullet had been fired into the fore-
head some time after death had taken
place.

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Realizing that something
pected had happened, Albert looked
dumbly from face to face until the

unex-

interpreter explained. For a moment
the Indian’s coppery face worked con-

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