hitect so immersed in an important contract that temporary
postponement of their plans was imperative. As if provided specially
to meet the situation along had come Rutland's urgent wire to
headquarters for a new chainman, one of his men having taken sick
suddenly. Phil had jumped at the opportunity for a taste of practical
survey work, and with Thorpe's assistance the matter had been arranged
readily and he had left the same night to join the Rutland party out
the line.

The battered old freight caboose in which the young engineers lived was
moved ahead from siding to siding by passing freight trains as Rutland
advised the Chief Despatcher of the work's progress. Scarcely a day
had passed that had not strung a few interesting beads of incident to
brighten the necklace of its routine monotonies--the squealing, kicking
baby rabbit which Anderson, the head chainman, had captured; the wild
duck which they had cornered in a thicket and which Bayley, the marker,
had insisted upon decorating with his white paint before he would let
it go; the occasional mess of speckled trout for which they angled; the
fresh baked pies and cakes they were sometimes able to buy from a
section-man's wife; the bear tracks and the bodies of wild animals
lured to death by the glare of the powerful headlights on the fast
trains at night; the excitement at the great ballast pit where the
gangs at work were running an unpopular cook out of camp; the very old
Indian who had stared at the dragging chain and muttered "Heap big
snake," and the very young Englishman who had gone crazy from fly-bites
and whom the sawmill gang had strapped to a rough litter in preparation
for rushing him to the North Bay hospital by the first train they could
flag. In spite of the mosquitoes, black flies and midges, which at
this season of the year were a decided affliction in the country
through which they were working, Kendrick had enjoyed the new
experience. Twenty miles average daily working distance, frequently
with an extra ten-mile walk back to the car, already had rounded the
erstwhile captain of the Varsity rugby champions into tackling
condition.

In spite of the fact that he had been up all night, therefore, his eyes
were bright with the mirror glisten which is the gift of long hours in
the open air. The black eye which had attracted unwelcome attention at
first no longer contributed to the amusement of the inquisitive, the
obtrusion of its remaining jaun