The homestead of the Ducats consisted partly of the original structure of great pine logs and partly of a more modern erection of sawn frame and shingles, the two joined securely end to end. The kitchen was in the old part, and it was to the kitchen that Flora led her vanquished brother and his conqueror. Here they found the mother and the two grandfathers, to whom Mark described the battle without exaggeration or reservation. The girl with green eyes corroborated his statements, and Jim Todhunter maintained a modest silence. "Did ye stand idle an' see yer brother bested by a stranger?" cried Mrs. Ducat. "Sure I did," answered Flora. "An' rightly, too," said old Archie McKim. "I ain't kickin'," said Mark, good-humoredly. "I asked for it." "But you kicked then, an' he didn't," retorted Flora. "It's the way we fight in the woods," said Mark to Jim. "What's that?" asked old McKim, with a cupped hand behind his good ear. "Footin' it in a fight," replied Mark. "Throwin' the foot." "A French trick," said Mr. McKim. "An' what of it?" cried old Hercules Ducat. "What's agin it, Archie McKim? Ain't a man's foot as much his own as his hand? French, d'ye say! Wasn't Black Dave Davi'son a Scot? An' didn't he use his feet? Wasn't he the wickedest fighter on the river? An' he done it all with his feet an' his teeth. But one fine day he drummed his heels on my chest, an' I up an' hove 'im clear acrost the roof o' Widdy Mary McElroy's smoke house--an' he never fit agin." "Black Dave Davi'son!" cried old Archie, his snow-white whiskers vibrating with scorn and excitement. "_Him_ a Scot! He was five quarters Madawaska French an' four thirds Tobique Injun. Reckon I'd oughter know! Didn't he chaw my ear once when him an' me was courtin' the same girl over to Kingswood Settlement?" "An' but for the Ducats with their Injun blood an' good buckwheat pancakes an' roasted moose meat, all this here Scottish gentility would have starved to death an' froze to death a hundred years ago an' more." Jim looked at Flora in amused embarrassment, and old Hercules saw it. He sat back in his chair and chuckled derisively. "She be easier on the eye to goggle at nor her gran'pas," he said, ignoring old Archie. "She gits her looks from the Ducats, as ye kin see. But ye'll find more divil nor gentility in her afore ye've knowed her much longer." "Grandpa Ducat always talks like that after he's lost at cards," explained the girl, seeing Jim's embarrassment. "I guess Grandpa McKim's been trimming him this afternoon." "Yer dead right!" said old Archie. "I took eighty-six cents offen 'im since dinner."