White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1924-09-19

Continued from Last Week.
The stiffness that followed was op-
pressive for long while. Then again
they became accustomed to it, that
silence as of Nature a-tiptoe, holding
breath, waiting, waiting. Waiting for
what? Waiting for the Millennium?
Waiting for some great and wonder
full end? The peaks, the clouds, the
forests, the creeks lapsing down with
a ceaseless tomtom at falls and sigh
ing sound in eddies and sometimes
sound as Of voices calling, through
the day, through the dusk, through
the black night. They both, after
that inexplicable explosion felt the
great wilderness almost oppressive.
Next morning, breaking trail, they
came to place where they made more
Roadway, the second-growth thinned
out. The deadfalls were fewer. The
horses by that night had practically
eaten out the natural feed by the
creekside, and had larger feed of
oats in consequence. A third night
Jack and Blunt camped by that rush
ing grade Of water, but by noon Of the
next day they came back from their
trail-breaking to pack and saddle and
be off uphill
Blunt walked ahead leading his sad
die horse, the packhorses followed,
and Jack afoot, leading his horse,
came last. They walked thus, instead
of riding, because the trail they had
cut was, by reason of the confgura-
ton of the hillslope there. often very
steep, often an affair practically of a
series Of steps in the earth made by
aid of pick and shovel, Jack working
behind Bunt as the latter swung the
ak to clear the path. Higher, they
had come on the old trail, or frag-
ments Of it easier, to clear. Feed for
the horses was not apparent, but both
men had desire to get away from
that dip. Each night spent there de-
pressed them. They felt frustrated,
banked. To look up at the same
trees, the same tassels Of Spanish
moss, to get to know the place as If
it were a living room, to know it in
detail Of tree and branch, was depress
ing in that it drove home on them the
fact that they were held up, not pro
crossing. So it was a relief to be
clear of the place again.
Up they went valiantly over the
trail they had cleared, and on to the
less wooded upper slope. Here they
mounted again, the grades easier On
in the afternoon they had again to
have resourse to the ak. The horses
clustered back, Jack holding the lines
:; of those that were startled by the
swing Of the ak as Blunt worked.
II STEADY, boy, steady!" he tolt
| them.
| They became used to it so long a!
| Blunt did not just drop off the saddle
too close to the tree to be attacked
| and swing the ak at once; became
used even to the crash of tree fall
ing backward in the woods, knew
that it was only as a signal for then
to step up, move on again. They tori
every blade Of spare grass tina
showed as they walked, broke of
leaves from bushes that took thei
| fancy, snatching snakes all the day.
| THANK God for cayuses," sale
/ hot oh
he put the ak in place again. "They
want just enough oats to make then
come into camp now and again.
kind of lollipop for them. But the,
can get along without it. Some o
! them don't know what oats is right
ly. Say, there's light ahead now
We're getting up in the world again
! We're round the bend of my thumb
the way showed you. When we ge
on top here I'll be able to take bear
ings easy We have sure come crash
ing through this bit Of forest! Made
more noise than horse-bell, heh?"
He turned round, laughing over hi!
remark, as if he unused that he who
had thrust moss in the bell for quiet.
sake, had then walked the echoes O.
the still wood with SO many ax-blows
the crash of so many trees falling.
Even as he turned Jack, behind him
saw o m e h ing rise ahead. He
though it was a bear, expected to see
it's bulk suddenly rush from them
But that absurptly risen dark silhou
cite between the colonnades of fiji
stems ahead was not of a bush, nor Of
bear
There was the sharp, darting crack
of a rifle and Bunt, without sound
fell prone to the ground while the