The Boss of Wind River

ods farms where they had spent the summer loafing or increasing the size of the clearings, from mills, from out-of-the-way holes and corners. They haunted the lumber companies'

ks's profane amazement. The latter, through the good offices of a middleman working for his rake-

every stick he could, and sell them in the drive, retaining only enough logs to run his mill on half time or a little better. This

king into consideration the unprofitable contract with the Clancys, showed a very narrow margin; and the consensus of advice he received was to

llmen and did little logging, either jobbing out such limits as they bought or buying their logs from loggers who had no mills. The letter stated that they wished to obtain from twenty million feet upward, in the log, deliverable at the

Joe immediately took train and called on Wismer & H

that we must have these logs by

own by then, of c

from a form which he took from his desk. In this agreement was a clause providing a penalty for non-delivery by

mple margin for delivery, you see, but we've got to have some guarantee that you'll make good, because we make oth

afterward he showed it to Locke, the lawyer pounced on that clause like a hawk, sw

d you sign that for? D

atter with it

ing short of it. Can't you read, or didn't you read? If you

thing," Jo

accept any logs whatever; and, moreover, you become their debtor and bind yourself to pay an amount

peated Wismer's explanation. "I'm sure to have th

y one, and may be twice as great as the loss to them. This is another of Nick Ryan's deadfalls-I recognize the turn of the ph

ket for his logs, or, rather, one having arranged itself for him, the next thing was to provide the logs themselves. He and Wri

take the Wind River limit, just acquired; Dennis McKenna, the walking boss, had a general oversight of the camps, but would div

decision, the foremen got t

Wind with McKenna and take a

n sticking pretty closely to the office, and the prospe

nd MacNutt, while behind them a wagon laden with t

rew, a light axe in his hand, gashing the trees with blazes at frequent intervals. He blazed them both back and front, until the road was plainly marked so that going and coming the way might be seen. To Joe the instinct of the old woodsman was mar

at present anything that would carry team and wagon served. So the crew slashed out a way with double-bitted or two-faced axes-"Methodist axes," as they were called in an unwarranted reflection upon that excellent denomination-throwing light, frail brid

m slid gently between brown roots and mossy banks. This meant water supply. Ruffed grouse roared up from under Joe's feet as he parted the bushes, and when he rose to his knees, having drunk his fill lying flat on the ground, he saw a big,

tout, green pole between them, slung his pot-hooks on it and below them his pots, and so was ready to minister to the needs of the inner man. With tape-line and

utting it to length. When a square timber was required, one man cut notches three feet apart down the sides of a prostrate trunk and split off the slabs. Another, a lean, wasp-waisted tiemaker, stripped to underclothes and moccasins, mounted one end with a

Buildings grew as if by magic. The wall-logs were mortised and skidded up into place; the whole was roofed in; the chinks were stuffed with moss and plastered with

k. The walking boss and the foreman sized up the situation with the sure rapidity of experts. They knew just how many feet of timber a given area held, h

ow and hard weather with odd flurries to make good slippin'-we can get out all we cut. But if she freezes hard and dry, and the snow's late a

g down a vista of brown tree-trunks which sloped gently away to a dense cedar sw

en," said the latter; "we

eading straight for them, McKenna gave

Shan M

f him," said J

ng boss commented. "'Rough Shan,

brush; his nose had a cant to the northeast, and his left eye was marred by a sinister cast. Add to these a chronic, ferocious scowl and subtract two front teeth, and you have the portrait of Rough Shan McCane, as Joe saw him. For attire he w

asked the

ot a camp over here a ways.

d the next limit in the name of a third party a couple of years be

on your east line

your logs out?

Lebret Creek and dri

own Wind River. Lebret Creek lay east of it. It

" said McCane. "Your timber ru

ff. McKenna looked after

a bad camp an' feeds his crew on whiskey. He has a wild bunch of Callahans, Red Mc

work done with whiske

p handy our boys will get it once in awhile. Still, MacNutt can hold 'em down. McCane laid him out a

ars in the camps. He owned a poisonous tongue and a deadly temper when aroused; but he had als

ets drunk on whiskey from McCane's camp or elsewhere, fire him at once."

daylights out of him," he said. "As for McCane, I look for trouble with him." Sud

me-" Jo

ined me with a peavey once, when I had only my bare hands. It's c

and felt assured that he would meet any trouble half-way. His own disposition being rather c