XXIX

Three weeks later the steam barge Pole Star sailed down the reach of
Saginaw Bay.

Thorpe had received letters from Carpenter advising him of a credit to
him at a Marquette bank, and inclosing a draft sufficient for current
expenses. Tim Shearer had helped make out the list of necessaries. In
time everything was loaded, the gang-plank hauled in, and the little
band of Argonauts set their faces toward the point where the Big Dipper
swings.

The weather was beautiful. Each morning the sun rose out of the frosty
blue lake water, and set in a sea of deep purple. The moon, once again
at the full, drew broad paths across the pathless waste. From the
southeast blew daily the lake trades, to die at sunset, and then
to return in the soft still nights from the west. A more propitious
beginning for the adventure could not be imagined.

The ten horses in the hold munched their hay and oats as peaceably as
though at home in their own stables. Jackson Hines had helped select
them from the stock of firms changing locality or going out of business.
His judgment in such matters was infallible, but he had resolutely
refused to take the position of barn-boss which Thorpe offered him.

"No," said he, "she's too far north. I'm gettin' old, and the rheumatics
ain't what you might call abandonin' of me. Up there it's colder than
hell on a stoker's holiday."

So Shearer had picked out a barn-boss of his own. This man was
important, for the horses are the mainstay of logging operations. He
had selected also, a blacksmith, a cook, four teamsters, half a dozen
cant-hook men, and as many handy with ax or saw.

"The blacksmith is also a good wood-butcher (carpenter)," explained
Shearer. "Four teams is all we ought to keep going at a clip. If we
need a few axmen, we can pick 'em up at Marquette. I think this gang'll
stick. I picked 'em."

There was not a young man in the lot. They were most of them in the
prime of middle life, between thirty and forty, rugged in appearance,
"cocky" in manner, with the swagger and the oath of so many buccaneers,
hard as nails. Altogether Thorpe thought them about as rough a set of
customers as he had ever seen. Throughout the day they played cards
on deck, and spat tobacco juice abroad, and swore incessantly. Toward
himself and Shearer their manner was an odd mixture of independent
equality and a slight deference. It was as much as to say, "You're the
boss, but I'm as good a man as you any day." Th