forces in motion, here was intrigue, here was direct practical
application of the powers he had been playing with.

"Why, it's great! It's better than any book I ever read!"

He wanted to know what he could do to help.

"Nothing except keep quiet," replied Thorpe, already uneasy, not lest
the boy should prove unreliable, but lest his very eagerness to seem
unconcerned should arouse suspicion. "You mustn't try to act any
different. If the men from up-river come by, be just as cordial to them
as you can, and don't act mysterious and important."

"All right," agreed Wallace, bubbling with excitement. "And then what do
you do--after you get the timber estimated?"

"I'll go South and try, quietly, to raise some money. That will be
difficult, because, you see, people don't know me; and I am not in a
position to let them look over the timber. Of course it will be merely
a question of my judgment. They can go themselves to the Land Office and
pay their money. There won't be any chance of my making way with that.
The investors will become possessed of certain 'descriptions' lying
in this country, all right enough. The rub is, will they have enough
confidence in me and my judgment to believe the timber to be what I
represent it?"

"I see," commented Wallace, suddenly grave.

That evening Injin Charley went on with his canoe building. He melted
together in a pot, resin and pitch. The proportion he determined by
experiment, for the mixture had to be neither hard enough to crack nor
soft enough to melt in the sun. Then he daubed the mess over all the
seams. Wallace superintended the operation for a time in silence.

"Harry," he said suddenly with a crisp decision new to his voice, "will
you take a little walk with me down by the dam. I want to talk with
you."

They strolled to the edge of the bank and stood for a moment looking at
the swirling waters.

"I want you to tell me all about logging," began Wallace. "Start from
the beginning. Suppose, for instance, you had bought this pine here we
were talking about,--what would be your first move?"

They sat side by side on a log, and Thorpe explained. He told of the
building of the camps, the making of the roads; the cutting, swamping,
travoying, skidding; the banking and driving. Unconsciously a little
of the battle clang crept into his narrative. It became a struggle, a
gasping tug and heave for supremacy between the man and the wilderness.
The excitement of war was in it