a marsh to camp.
A pole trail consists of saplings laid end to end, and supported three or four feet above wet places by means of sawbuck-like structures at their extremities. To a river-man or a tight-rope dancer they are easy walks. All others must proceed cautiously in contrite memory of their sins.
Orde marched across the first two lengths confidently enough. Then he heard a splash and lamentations. Turning, he perceived Charlie, covered with mud, in the act of clambering up one of the small trestles.
“Ain't got no caulks!” ran the lamentations. “The—— of a—— of a pole-trail, anyways!”
He walked ahead gingerly, threw his hands aloft, bent forward, then suddenly protruded his stomach, held out one foot in front of him, spasmodically half turned, and then, realising the case hopeless, wilted like a wet rag, to clasp the pole trail both by arm and leg. This saved him from falling off altogether, but swung him underneath, where he hung like the sloths in the picture-books. A series of violent wriggles brought him, red-faced and panting, astride the pole, whence, his feelings beyond mere speech, he sadly eyed his precious derby, which lay, crown up, in the mud below.
Orde contemplated the spectacle seriously.
“Sorry I haven't got time to enjoy you just now, Charlie,” he remarked. “I'd take it slower, if I were you.”
He departed, catching fragments of vows anent never going on any more errands for nobody, and getting his time if ever again he went away from his wanigan.
Orde stopped short outside the fringe of brush to utter another irrepressible chuckle of amusement.
The centre of the dam was occupied by Reed. The old man was still in full regalia, his plug hat fuzzier than ever, and thrust even farther back on his head, his coat-tails and loose trousers flapping at his every movement as he paced back and forth with military precision. Over his shoulder he carried a long percussion-lock shotgun. Not thirty feet away, perched along the bank, for all the world like a row of cormorants, sat the rivermen, watching him solemnly and in silence.
“What's the matter?” inquired Orde, approaching.
The old man surveyed him with a snort of disgust.
“If the law of the land don't protect me, I'll protect myself, sir,” he proclaimed. “I give ye fair warning! I ain't a-going to have my property interfered with no more.”
“But surely,” said Orde, “we have a right to run our logs through. It's an open river.”
“And hev ye been running your logs through?” cried the old man excitedly. “Hev ye? First off ye begin to tear down my dam; and then, when the river begins a-roarin' and a-ragin' through, then you tamper with my improvements furthermore, a-lowerin' the gate and otherwise a-modifyin' my structure.”
Orde stepped forward to say something further. Immediately Reed wheeled, his thumb on the hammer.
“All right, old Spirit of '76,” replied Orde. “Don't shoot; I'll come down.”
He walked back to the waiting row, smiling quizzically.
“Well, you calamity howlers, what do you think of it?”
Nobody answered, but everybody looked expectant.
“Think he'd shoot?” inquired Orde of Tom North.
“I know he would,” replied North earnestly. “That crazy-headed kind are just the fellers to rip loose.”
“I think myself he probably would,” agreed Orde.
“Surely,” spoke up Newmark, “whatever the status of the damage suits, you have the legal right to run your logs.”
Orde rolled a quizzical eye in his direction.
“Per-fect-ly correct, son,” he drawled, “but we're engaged in the happy occupation of getting out logs. By the time the law was all adjusted and a head of steam up, the water'd be down. In this game, you get out logs first, and think about law afterward.”
“How about legal damages?” insisted Newmark.
“Legal damages!” scoffed Orde. “Legal damages! Why, we count legal damages as part of our regular expenses—like potatoes. It's lucky it's so,” he added. “If anybody paid any attention to legal technicalities, there'd never be a log delivered. A man always has enemies.
“Well, what are you going to do?” persisted Newmark.
Orde thrust back his felt hat and ran his fingers through his short, crisp hair.
“There you've got me,” he confessed, “but, if necessary, we'll pile the old warrior.”
He walked to the edge of the dam and stood looking down current. For perhaps a full minute he remained there motionless, his hat clinging to one side, his hand in his hair. Then he returned to the grimly silent rivermen.
“Boys,” he commanded briefly, “get your peavies and come along.”
He led the way past the mill to the shallows below.
“There's a trifle of wading to do,” he announced. “Bring down two logs—fairly big—and hold them by that old snag,” he ordered. “Whoa-up! Easy! Hold them end on—no, pointing up stream—fix 'em about ten foot apart—that's it! George, drive a couple of stakes each side of them to hold 'em. Correct! Now, run down a couple dozen more and pile them across those two—side on to the stream, of course. Roll 'em up—that's the ticket!”
Orde had been splashing about in the shallow water, showing where each timber was to be placed. He drew back, eyeing the result with satisfaction. It looked rather like a small and bristly pier.
Next he cast his eye about and discovered a partially submerged boulder on a line with the newly completed structure. Against this he braced the ends of two more logs, on which he once more caused to be loaded at right angles many timbers. An old stub near shore furnished him the basis of a third pier. He staked a thirty-inch butt for a fourth; and so on, until the piers, in conjunction with the small centre jam already mentioned, extended quite across the river.
All this was accomplished in a very short time, and immediately below the mill, but beyond sight from the sluice-gate of the dam.
“Now, boys,” commanded Orde, “shove off some shore logs, and let them come down.”
“We'll have a jam sure,” objected Purdy stupidly.
“No, my son, would we?” mocked Orde. “I surely hope not!”
The stray logs floating down with the current the rivermen caught and arranged to the best possible advantage about the improvised piers. A good riverman understands the correlation of forces represented by saw-logs and water-pressure. He knows how to look for the key-log in breaking jams; and by the inverse reasoning, when need arises he can form a jam as expertly as Koosy-oonek himself—that bad little god who brings about the disagreeable and undesired—“who hides our pipes, steals our last match, and brings rain on the just when they want to go fishing.”
So in ten seconds after the shore logs began drifting down from above, the jam was taking shape. Slowly it formed, low and broad. Then, as the water gathered pressure, the logs began to slip over one another. The weight of the topmost sunk those beneath to the bed of the stream. This to a certain extent dammed back the water. Immediately the pressure increased. More logs were piled on top. The piers locked the structure. Below the improvised dam the water fell almost to nothing, and above it, swirling in eddies, grumbling fiercely, bubbling, gurgling, searching busily for an opening, the river, turned back on itself, gathered its swollen and angry forces.
“That will do, boys,” said Orde with satisfaction.
He led the way to the bank and sat down. The men followed his example. Every moment the water rose, and each instant, as more logs came down the current, the jam became more formidable.
“Nothing