"About two weeks." Bob said nothing more, but next day he ruminated long in the snow-still forest at Eight, trying to apportion in his own mind the twelve days' work. If it did not go at a two weeks' gait, he speedily wanted to know why. When the sleighs failed to return up the ice road with expected regularity, Bob tramped down to the "banks" to see what the trouble was. When he returned, he remarked casually to Jim Tally: "I fired Powell off the job as foreman, and put in Downy." "Why?" asked Tally. "I put Powell in there because I thought he was an almighty good worker." "He is," said Bob; "too good. I found them a little shorthanded down there, and getting discouraged. The sleighs were coming in on them faster than they could unload. The men couldn't see how they were going to catch up, so they'd slacked down a little, which made it worse. Powell had his jacket off and was working like the devil with a canthook. He does about the quickest and hardest yank with a canthook I ever saw," mused Bob. "Well?" demanded Tally. Oh," said Bob, "I told him if that was the kind of a job he wanted, he could have it. And I told Downy to take charge. I don't pay a foreman's wages for canthook work; I hire him to keep the men busy, and he sure can't do it if he occupies his time and attention rolling logs." "He was doing his best to straighten things out," said Tally. "Well, I'm now paying him for his best," replied Bob, philosophically. But if it had been a question of how most quickly to skid the logs brought in by the sleighs, Bob would never have dreamed of questioning Powell's opinion, although he might later have demanded expert corroboration from Tally. The outdoor life, too, interested him and kept him in train- X ing, both physically and spiritually. He realized his mis takes, but they were now mistakes of judgment rather than of mechanical accuracy, and he did not worry over them once they were behind him. When Welton returned from California toward the close of the season, he found the young man buoyant and happy, deeply absorbed, well liked, and in a fair way to learn something about the business. Almost immediately after his return, the mill was closed down. The remaining lumber in the yards was shipped out as rapidly as possible. By the end of September the work was over. Bob perforce accepted a vacation of some months while affairs were in preparation for the westward exodus. Then he answered a summons to meet Mr. Welton at the Chicago offices. He entered the little outer office he had left so downheartedly three years before. Harvey and his two assistants sat on the high stools in front of the shelf-like desk. The same pictures of record loads, large trees, mill crews and logging camps hung on the walls. The same atmosphere of peace and immemorial quiet brooded over the place. Through the half-open door Bob could see Mr. Fox, his leg swung over the arm of his revolving chair, chatting in a leisurely fashion with some visitor. No one had heard him enter. He stood for a moment staring at the three bent backs before him. He remembered the infinite details of the work he had left, the purchasings of innumerable little things, the regulation of outlays, the balancings of expenditures, the constantly shifting property values, the cost of tools, food, implements, wages, machinery, transportation, operation. And in addition he brought to mind the minute and vexatious mortgage and sale and rental business having to do with the old cut-over lands; the legal complications; the questions of arbitration and privilege. And beyond that his mind glimpsed dimly the extent of other interests, concerning which he knew little investment interests, and silent interests in various manufacturing enterprises where the Company had occasionally invested a surplus by way of a flyer. In this quiet place all these things were correlated, compared, docketed, and filed away. In the brains of the four men before him all these infinite details were laid out in order. He knew that Harvey could answer specific questions as to any feature of any one of these activities. All the turmoil, the rush and roar of the river, the mills, the open lakes, the great wildernesses passed through this silent, dusty room. The problems that kept a dozen men busy in the solving came here also, together with a hundred others. Bob recalled his sight of the hurried, wholesale shipping clerk he had admired when, discouraged and discredited, he had left the office three years before. He had thought that individual busy, and had contrasted his activity with the somnolence of this office. Busy! Why, he, Bob, had over and over again been ten times as busy. At the thought he chuckled aloud. Harvey and his assistants turned to the sound. "Hullo, Harvey; hullo Archie!" cried the young man. "I'm certainly glad to see you. You're the only men I ever saw who could be really bang-up rushed and never show it." |