By virtue of that same careless remark, however, Radway was so confirmed in his belief as to his own culpability that he quite overlooked Fabian's just contention--that the mere thinness of the ice was in reality no excuse for the losing of the horses.So Pat and Henrys were not discharged--were not instructed to "get their time." Fabian Laveque promptly demanded his.
"Sacre bleu!" said he to old Jackson."I no work wid dat dam-fool dat no t'ink wit' hees haid."This deprived the camp at once of a teamster and a team.When you reflect that one pair of horses takes care of the exertions of a crew of sawyers, several swampers, and three or four cant-hook men, you will readily see what a serious derangement their loss would cause.And besides, the animals themselves are difficult to replace.
They are big strong beasts, selected for their power, staying qualities, and intelligence, worth anywhere from three to six hundred dollars a pair.They must be shipped in from a distance.
And, finally, they require a very careful and patient training before they are of value in co-operating with the nicely adjusted efforts necessary to place the sawlog where it belongs.Ready-trained horses are never for sale during the season.
Radway did his best.He took three days to search out a big team of farm horses.Then it became necessary to find a driver.After some deliberation he decided to advance Bob Stratton to the post, that "decker" having had more or less experience the year before.
Erickson, the Swede, while not a star cant-hook man, was nevertheless sure and reliable.Radway placed him in Stratton's place.But now he must find a swamper.He remembered Thorpe.
So the young man received his first promotion toward the ranks of skilled labor.He gained at last a field of application for the accuracy he had so intelligently acquired while road-making, for now a false stroke marred a saw-log; and besides, what was more to his taste, he found himself near the actual scene of operation, at the front, as it were.He had under his very eyes the process as far as it had been carried.
In his experience here he made use of the same searching analytical observation that had so quickly taught him the secret of the ax-swing.He knew that each of the things he saw, no matter how trivial, was either premeditated or the product of chance.If premeditated, he tried to find out its reason for being.If fortuitous, he wished to know the fact, and always attempted to figure out the possibility of its elimination.
So he learned why and when the sawyers threw a tree up or down hill; how much small standing timber they tried to fell it through;what consideration held for the cutting of different lengths of log;how the timber was skilfully decked on the skids in such a manner that the pile should not bulge and fall, and so that the scaler could easily determine the opposite ends of the same log;--in short, a thousand and one little details which ordinarily a man learns only as the exigencies arise to call in experience.Here, too, he first realized he was in the firing line.
Thorpe had assigned him as bunk mate the young fellow who assisted Tom Broadhead in the felling.Henry Paul was a fresh-complexioned, clear-eyed, quick-mannered young fellow with an air of steady responsibility about him.He came from the southern part of the State, where, during the summer, he worked on a little homestead farm of his own.After a few days he told Thorpe that he was married, and after a few days more he showed his bunk mate the photograph of a sweet-faced young woman who looked trustingly out of the picture.
"She's waitin' down there for me, and it ain't so very long till spring," said Paul wistfully."She's the best little woman a man ever had, and there ain't nothin' too good for her, chummy!"Thorpe, soul-sick after his recent experiences with the charity of the world, discovered a real pleasure in this fresh, clear passion.
As he contemplated the abounding health, the upright carriage, the sparkling, bubbling spirits of the young woodsman, he could easily imagine the young girl and the young happiness, too big for a little backwoods farm.
Three days after the newcomer had started in at the swamping, Paul, during their early morning walk from camp to the scene of their operations, confided in him further.
"Got another letter, chummy," said he, "come in yesterday.She tells me," he hesitated with a blush, and then a happy laugh, "that they ain't going to be only two of us at the farm next year.""You mean!" queried Thorpe.
"Yes," laughed Paul, "and if it's a girl she gets named after her mother, you bet."The men separated.In a moment Thorpe found himself waist-deep in the pitchy aromatic top of an old bull-sap, clipping away at the projecting branches.After a time he heard Paul's gay halloo.
"TimBER!" came the cry, and then the swish-sh-sh,--CRASH of the tree's fall.
Thorpe knew that now either Hank or Tom must be climbing with the long measuring pole along the prostrate trunk, marking by means of shallow ax-clips where the saw was to divide the logs.Then Tom shouted something unintelligible.The other men seemed to understand, however, for they dropped their work and ran hastily in the direction of the voice.Thorpe, after a moment's indecision, did the same.
He arrived to find a group about a prostrate man.The man was Paul.
Two of the older woodsmen, kneeling, were conducting coolly a hasty examination.At the front every man is more or less of a surgeon.
"Is he hurt badly?" asked Thorpe; "what is it?""He's dead," answered one of the other men soberly.
With the skill of ghastly practice some of them wove a litter on which the body was placed.The pathetic little procession moved in the solemn, inscrutable forest.
When the tree had fallen it had crashed through the top of another, leaving suspended in the branches of the latter a long heavy limb.
A slight breeze dislodged it.Henry Paul was impaled as by a javelin.
