It was a strange thing, and not altogether satisfactory to the public mind, to have _two_ strongest men in the village. The question of comparative standing in the community ought to be raised and settled in the usual way. Raoul was perfectly willing, and at times (commonly on Saturday nights) very eager. But Prosper was not. "No," he said, one March night, when he was boiling maple-sap in the sugar-bush with little Ovide Rossigno (who had a lyric passion for holding the coat while another man was fighting)—"no, for what shall I fight with Raoul? As boys we have played together. Once, in the rapids of _la Belle Rivière_, when I have fallen in the water, I think he has saved my life. He was stronger, then, than me. I am always a friend to him. If I beats him now, am I stronger? No, but weaker. And if he beats me, what is the sense of that? Certainly I shall not like it. What is to gain?" Down in the store of old Girard, that night, Vaillantcœur was holding forth after a different fashion. He stood among the cracker-boxes and flour-barrels, with a background of shelves laden with bright-colored calicoes, and a line of tin pails hanging overhead, and stated his view of the case with vigor. He even pulled off his coat and rolled up his shirt-sleeve to show the knotty arguments with which he proposed to clinch his opinion. "That Leclère," said he, "that little Prosper Leclère! He thinks himself one of the strongest—a fine fellow! But I tell you he is _lâche_. If he is clever? Yes. But he is a poltroon. He knows well that I can flatten him out like a _crêpe_ in the frying-pan. But he is afraid. He has not as much courage as the musk-rat. You stamp on the bank. He dives. He swims away. Bah!" "How about that time he cut loose the jam of logs in the Rapide des Cédres?" said old Girard from his corner. Vaillantcœur's black eyes sparkled and he twirled his mustache fiercely. "_Sa-prie!_" he cried, "that was nothing! Any man with an axe can cut a log. But to fight—that is another affair. That demands the brave heart. The strong man who will not fight is a coward. Some day I will put him through the mill—you shall see what that small Leclère is made of, _sacrédam!_" Of course, affairs had not come to this pass all at once. It was a long history, beginning with the time when the two boys had played together, and Raoul was twice as strong as the other, and was very proud of it. Prosper did not care; it was all right so long as they had a good time. But then Prosper began to do things better and better. Raoul did not understand it; he was jealous. Why should he not always be the leader? He had more force. Why should Prosper get ahead? Why should he have better luck at the fishing and the hunting and the farming? It was by some trick. There was no justice in it.