since reasoned all this out for himself; so he understood; while to
California John the matter had always been one to take for granted. Bob
leaned forward, his earnest, sun-browned young face flushed with the
sincerity--and the embarrassment--of his exposition. Amy nodded from
time to time, her eyes shining, her glance every few moments seeking in
triumph that of her brother. California John smoked.

Finally Bob put it squarely to Thorne.

"So you'd like to join the Service," said Thorne slowly. "I suppose
you've thought of the chance you're giving up? Welton will take you into
partnership in time, of course."

"I know. It seems foolish. Can't make it seem anything else," Bob
admitted.

"You'd have to take your chances," Thorne persisted. "I couldn't help
you. A ranger's salary is ninety a month now, and find yourself and
horses. Have you any private means?"

"Not enough to say so."

"There's another thing," Thorne went on. "This forestry of our
government is destined to be a tremendous affair; but what we need more
just now is better logging methods among the private loggers. It would
count more than anything else if you'd stay just where you are and give
us model operations in your own work."

Bob shook his head.

"Perhaps you don't know men like Mr. Welton as well as I do," said he;
"I couldn't change his methods. That's absolutely out of the question.
And," he went on with a sudden flash of loyalty to what the old-timers
had meant, "I don't believe I'd want to."

"Not want to!" cried Amy.

"No," pursued Bob doggedly, "not unless he could see the point himself
and of his own accord. He's done a great work in his time, and he's
grown old at it. I wouldn't for anything in the world do anything to
shake his faith in what he's done, even if he's doing it wrong now."

"He and his kind have always slaughtered the forests shamefully!" broke
in Amy with some heat.

"They opened a new country for a new people," said Bob gently. "Perhaps
they did it wastefully; perhaps not. I notice you've got to use lots of
lubricating oil on a new machine. But there was nobody else to do it any
different."

"Then you'd let them go on wasting and destroying?" demanded Amy
scornfully.

"I don't know," hesitated Bob; "I haven't thought all this out. Perhaps
I'm not very much on the think. It seems to me rather this way: We've
got to have lumber, haven't we? And somebody has to cut it and supply
it. Men like Mr. Welton are doi