The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1904-11-30

banked and driven during the short
time he had lain in the Bay City hos
pital More to solve the problem than
in any hope of work he set out for the
logging road.
Another three miles brought him to
camp. 1t looked strangely wet and
sodden and deserted. In fact, Thorpe
found bare half dozen people in it.
Railway, the cook and four men who
were helping to pack up the movables.
The jobber showed strong traces of
the strain he had undergone, but greet
ed Thorpe almost jovially.
Hello, young man!' he shouted at
Thorpe's mud splashed figure. "Come
back to view the remains? All well
again, heigh? That's goodT'
Il didn't know you were through"
explained Thorpe, "and / came to see
If could get job
''Well, now, / am Sorry cried Rad
way. "You can turn in and help,
though, If you want to-"
Thorpe greeted the cook and old Jack
son Hines, the only two whom he
knew, and set to work to tie up bum
dies of blankets and to collect axes,
peavies and tools of all descriptions.
That evening the seven dined together
at one end of the long table The big
room exhaled already the atmosphere
of desertion.
''NOt much like old times, is she?"
laughed Railway. "Can't you just shut
your eyes and hear Baptiste say, Max
heem de soup one tam more for meY
She's pretty empty now"
Jackson Hines looked whimsically
down the bare board 'More room
than God made for geese in Ireland"
was his comment
After supper they sat outside for a
little time to smoke their pipes, chair
tilted against the logs of the cabins
but soon the chill Of melting snow
drove them indoors The four team
sters played seven up in the cook camp
by the light of barn lantern, while
Thorpe and the cook wrote letters
Thorpe's was to his sister.
81 have been in the hospital for
about month";" he wrote. Nothing
serious-a crack on the head, which is
all right now. But cannot get home
this summer, nor, am afraid can we
arrange about the school this year. /
am about $40 ahead of where l was
last fall, so you see it is slow business.
This summer am going into a mill,
but the wages for green labor are not
very high there either" and so on.
When Miss Helen Thorpe, aged sew
enteen, received this document she
stamped her foot almost angrily.
you'd think he was day laborerv'
she cried. "Why doesn't he try for a
clerkship or something in the city
where he'd have a chance to use his
brainsY
And thus she came to feeling rebel
liously that her brother had been a lit
tie selfish in his choice of an occupa-
ton; that he had sacrificed her inclina-
lions to his own.
After finishing the letter Thorpe lit
his pipe and strolled out into the dark
stopped amazed
Through the narrow window he could
see Railway seated in front of the
stove. He had sunk down into his
chair until he rested on almost the
small Of his back. his legs were stuck
straight out in front of him, his chin
rested on his breast, and his two arms
hung listless at his side, a pipe half
falling from the fingers of one hand.
All the facetious lines had turned to
pathos.
whats the matter with the boss.
anyway" asked Thorpe in low voice
Of Jackson Hines when the seven up
game was finished.
'Hain't We heardF' inquired the old
man in surprise.
"Why, no. What?"
Busted" said the old men senten-
tiously.
'How? What do you meanY'
"What say. He's busted. That
freshet caught him too quick They's
more than a million and a half logs
left in the woods that can't be got out
this year, and as his contract calls for
a finished job he don't get nothin' for
what he's DONE"
That's a queer rig" commented
Thorpe. "He's done a lot of valuable
work here. The timber's cut and skid
ded anyway, and he's delivered a good
deal of it to the main drive. The NJ.
& d. outfit get all the advantage of
that"
''They do, my son. When old Days /
hand gets near anything it cramps l
don't know how the old man come to
make such contrac', but he did. Re-
suit is he's out his expenses and time"
The exceptionally early break up Of
the spring, combined with the fact
that owing to the series Of incidents
ind accidents already sketched the ac-
tual cutting and skidding had fallen so
far behind, caught Railway unawares.