With its back to the western wall there stood in the centre the factory
itself, a good log building of somewhat spacious size; its big room,
divided by a breast-high solid railing, with a small gate in the
middle, serving as office and general receiving-place. Beyond the
railing, in the smaller space toward the north, there stood the great
wooden desk of the factor, its massive book of accounts always open on
its face, its hand-made drawers filled with the documents of the
Company. Here McElroy was wont to take account of the furs brought in,
to distribute recompense, and to enforce the simple law. Attached to
this room on the south was the great store-room, packed with those
articles of merchandise most likely to seem of worth in savage eyes and
brought, with such infinite labour by canoe and portage, from those
favoured lower points whose waters admitted the yearly ships--namely,
rifles and ammunition, knives of all sorts, bolts of bright cloth and
beads of the colour of the rainbow, great iron kettles such as might
hang most fittingly above an open fire, and bright woven garments made
by hands across seas.

At the back of the big room was the small one where McElroy and Ridgar
had their living, furnished scantily with a bed and table, an open
fireplace and crane, some rude, hand-made chairs, and a shelf of books.

And to this post of De Seviere had come in the dusk of the previous
night a little company of people.

They were tired and travel-stained, with their belongings in packs on
the shoulders of the men, and the joy of the venturer in their eager
faces.

From far down in the country below the Rainy River they had come,