you! If anybody follows her, I do, and
I'm needed here among such a pack of idiots. There's no danger in that
baby face. She wouldn't give me away! You double and work like forty,
while me and Wessner will take the axes and begin to cut in on the other
side."

"What about the noise?" asked Wessner.

"No difference about the noise," answered Jack. "She took us to be from
McLean's gang, slick as grease. Make the chips fly!"

So all of them attacked the big tree.

Freckles sat on one of his benches and waited. In their haste to fell
the tree and load it, so that the teamsters could start, and leave them
free to attack another, they had forgotten to rebind him.

The Angel was on the trail and safely started. The cold perspiration
made Freckles' temples clammy and ran in little streams down his chest.
It would take her more time to follow the trail, but her safety was
Freckles' sole thought in urging her to go that way. He tried to figure
on how long it would require to walk to the carriage. He wondered if the
Bird Woman had unhitched. He followed the Angel every step of the way.
He figured on when she would cross the path of the clearing, pass the
deep pool where his "find-out" frog lived, cross Sleepy Snake Creek, and
reach the carriage.

He wondered what she would say to the Bird Woman, and how long it would
take them to pack and start. He knew now that they would understand, and
the Angel would try to get the Boss there in time to save his wager.
She could never do it, for the saw was over half through, and Jack and
Wessner cutting into the opposite side of the tree. It appeared as if
they could fell at least that tree, before McLean could come, and if
they did he lost his wager.

When it was down, would they rebind him and leave him for Wessner to
wreak his insane vengeance on, or would they take him along to the next
tree and dispose of him when they had stolen all the timber they could?
Jack had said that he should not be touched until he left. Surely he
would not run all that risk for one tree, when he had many others of far
greater value marked. Freckles felt that he had some hope to cling to
now, but he found himself praying that the Angel would hurry.

Once Jack came to Freckles and asked if he had any water. Freckles arose
and showed him where he kept his drinking-water. Jack drank in great
gulps, and as he passed back the bucket, he said: "When a man's got a
chance of catching a fine girl like that, he