up the hill, and then marched down again,”
he recited; then burst into his deep roar of laughter.
“Now you see, boys,” he said, digging his fists into his eyes, “if you'd put up a row, what we'd have got into. No blue-coats in mine, thank you. Well, push the grub pile, and then get at those logs. It's a case of flood-water now.”
But Reed, having recovered from his astonishment, had still his say.
“I tell ye, I'm not done with ye yet,” he threatened, shaking his bony forefinger in Orde's face. “I'll sue ye for damages, and I'll GIT 'em, too.”
“See here, you old mossback,” said Orde, thrusting his bulky form to the fore, “you sue just as soon as you want to. You can't get at it any too quick to suit us. But just now you get out of this camp, and you stay out. You're an old man, and we don't want to be rough with you, but you're biting off more than you can chew. Skedaddle!”
Reed hesitated, waving his long arms about, flail-like, as though to begin a new oration.
“Now, do hop along,” urged Orde. “We'll pay you any legitimate damages, of course, but you can't expect to hang up a riverful of logs just on a notion. And we're sick of you. Oh, hell, then! See here, you two; just see that this man leaves camp.”
Orde turned square on his heel. Reed, after a glance at the two huge rivermen approaching, beat a retreat to his mill, muttering and wrathful still.
“Well, good-bye, boys,” said Daly, pulling on his overcoat; “I'll just get along and bail the boys out of that village calaboose. I reckon they've had a good night's rest. Be good!”
The fringe of trees to eastward showed clearly against the whitening sky. Hundreds of birds of all kinds sang in an ecstasy. Another day had begun. Already men with pike-poles were guiding the sullen timbers toward the sluice-way.
IV
When Newmark awoke once more to interest in affairs, the morning was well spent. On the river the work was going forward with the precision of clockwork. The six-foot lowering of the sluice-way had produced a fine current, which sucked the logs down from above. Men were busily engaged in “sacking” them from the sides of the pond toward its centre, lest the lowering water should leave them stranded. Below the dam the jam crew was finding plenty to do in keeping them moving in the white-water and the shallows. A fine sun, tempered with a prophetic warmth of later spring, animated the scene. Reed had withdrawn to the interior of his mill, and appeared to have given up the contest.
Some of the logs shot away down the current, running freely. To these the crews were not required to pay any attention. With luck, a few of the individual timbers would float ten, even twenty, miles before some chance eddy or fortuitous obstruction would bring them to rest. Such eddies and obstructions, however, drew a constant toll from the ranks of the free-moving logs, so that always the volume of timbers floating with the current diminished, and always the number of logs caught and stranded along the sides of the river increased. To restore these to the faster water was the especial province of the last and most expert crew—the rear.
Orde discovered about noon that the jam crew was having its troubles. Immediately below Reed's dam ran a long chute strewn with boulders, which was alternately a shallow or a stretch of white-water according as the stream rose or fell. Ordinarily the logs were flushed over this declivity by opening the gate, behind which a head of water had been accumulated. Now, however, the efficiency of the gate had been destroyed. Orde early discovered that he was likely to have trouble in preventing the logs rushing through the chute from grounding into a bad jam on the rapids below.
For a time the jam crew succeeded in keeping the “wings” clear. In the centre of the stream, however, a small jam formed, like a pier. Along the banks logs grounded, and were rolled over by their own momentum into places so shallow as to discourage any hope of refloating them unless by main strength. As the sluicing of the nine or ten million feet that constituted this particular drive went forward, the situation rapidly became worse.
“Tom, we've got to get flood-water unless we want to run into an awful job there,” said Orde to the foreman. “I wonder if we can't drop that gate 'way down to get something for a head.”
The two men examined the chute and the sluice-gate attentively for some time.
“If we could clear out the splinters and rubbish, we might spike a couple of saplings on each side for the gate to slide down into,” speculated North. “Might try her on.”
The logs were held up in the pond, and a crew of men set to work to cut away, as well as they might in the rush of water, the splintered ends of the old sill and apron. It was hard work. Newmark, watching, thought it impracticable. The current rendered footing impossible, so all the work had to be done from above. Wet wood gripped the long saws vice-like, so that a man's utmost strength could scarcely budge them. The water deadened the force of axe-blows. Nevertheless, with the sure persistence of the riverman, they held to it. Orde, watching them a few moments, satisfied himself that they would succeed, and so departed up river to take charge of the rear.
This crew he found working busily among some overflowed woods. They were herding the laggards of the flock. The subsidence of the water consequent upon the opening of the sluice-gate had left stranded and in shallows many hundreds of the logs. These the men sometimes, waist deep in the icy water, owing to the extreme inequality of the bottom, were rolling over and over with their peavies until once more they floated. Some few the rivermen were forced to carry bodily, ten men to a side, the peavies clamped in as handles. When once they were afloat, the task became easier. From the advantage of deadwood, stumps, or other logs the “sackers” pushed the unwieldy timbers forward, leaping, splashing, heaving, shoving, until at last the steady current of the main river seized the logs and bore them away. With marvellous skill they topped the dripping, bobby, rolling timbers, treading them over and over, back and forth, in unconscious preservation of equilibrium.
There was a good deal of noise and fun at the rear. The crew had been divided, and a half worked on either side the river. A rivalry developed as to which side should advance fastest in the sacking. It became a race. Momentary success in getting ahead of the other fellow was occasion for exultant crowing, while a mishap called forth ironic cheers and catcalls from the rival camp. Just as Orde came tramping up the trail, one of the rivermen's caulks failed to “bite” on an unusually smooth, barked surface. His foot slipped; the log rolled; he tried in vain to regain his balance, and finally fell in with a heavy splash.
The entire river suspended work to send up a howl of delight. As the unfortunate crawled out, dripping from head to foot, he was greeted by a flood of sarcasm and profane inquiry that left no room for even his acknowledged talents of repartee. Cursing and ashamed, he made his way ashore over the logs, spirting water at every step. There he wrung out his woollen clothes as dry as he could, and resumed work.
Hardly had Orde the opportunity to look about at the progress making, however, before he heard his name shouted from the bank. Looking up, to his surprise he saw the solemn cook waving a frantic dish-towel at him. Nothing could induce the cook to attempt the logs.
“What is it, Charlie?” asked Orde, leaping ashore and stamping the loose water from his boots.
“It's all off,” confided the cook pessimistically. “It's no good. He's stopped us now.”
“What's off? Who's stopped what?”
“Reed. He's druv the men from the dam with a shotgun. We might as well quit.”
“Shotgun, hey!” exclaimed Orde. “Well, the old son of a gun!” He thought a moment, his lips puckered as though to whistle; then, as usual, he laughed amusedly. “Let's go take a look at the army,” said he.
He swung away at a round pace, followed