On the way down the narrow trail Bob found himself near the two men from
his own camp. He chaffed them good-humouredly over their lack of skill
in the contests, to which they replied in the same spirit.
Arrived at camp, Thorne turned to face his followers, who gathered in a
group to listen.
"Let's have a little riding, boys," said he. "Bring out a horse or two
and some saddles. Each man must saddle his horse, circle that tree down
the road, return, unsaddle and throw up both hands to show he's done."
Bob was amused to see how the aspect of the men changed at this
announcement. The lithe young fellows, who had been looking pretty sober
over the records they had made at shooting, brightened visibly and ran
with some eagerness to fetch out their own horses and saddles. Some of
the others were not so pleased, notably two of the young fellows from
the valley towns. Still others remained stolidly indifferent to a trial
in which they could not hope to compete with the professional riders,
but in which neither would they fail.
The results proved the accuracy of this reasoning. A new set of stars
rose to the ascendant, while the heroes of the upper meadow dropped into
obscurity. Most of the mountain men saddled expeditiously but soberly
their strong and capable mountain horses, rode the required distance,
and unsaddled deftly. It was part of their everyday life to be able to
do such things well. The two town boys, and, to Bob's surprise, one of
his lumberjacks, furnished the comic relief. They frightened the horses
allotted them, to begin with; threw the saddles aboard in a mess which
it was necessary to untangle; finally clambered on awkwardly and rode
precariously amid the yells and laughter of the spectators.
"How you expect to be a ranger, if you can't ride?" shouted some one at
the lumberjack.
"If horses don't plumb _detest_ me, I reckon I can learn!" retorted the
shanty boy, stoutly. "This ain't my game!"
But when young Pollock, whom Bob recognized as Jim's oldest, was called
out, the situation was altered. He appeared leading a beautiful,
half-broken bay, that snorted and planted its feet and danced away from
the unaccustomed crowd. Nevertheless the lad, as impassive as an image,
held him well in hand, awaiting Thorne's signal.
"Go!" called the Supervisor, his eyes on his watch.
The boy, still grasping the hackamore in his left hand, with his right
threw the saddle blanket over the animal's back. Stooping again, he
seized the heavy stock saddle by the horn, flipped it high in the air,
and brought it across the horse with so skilful a jerk that not only did
the skirts, the heavy stirrup and the horsehair cinch fall properly, but
the cinch itself swung so far under the horse's belly that young Pollock
was able to catch it deftly before it swung back. To thrust the broad
latigo through the rings, jerk it tight, and fasten it securely was the
work of an instant. With a yell to his horse the boy sprang into the
saddle. The animal bounded forward, snorting and buck-plunging, his eye
wild, his nostril wide. Flung with apparent carelessness in the saddle,
the rider, his body swaying and bending and giving gracefully to every
bound, waved his broad hat, uttering shrill _yips_ of encouragement and
admonition to his mount. The horse straightened out and thundered swift
as an arrow toward the tree that marked the turning point. With
unslackened gait, with loosened rein, he swept fairly to the tree. It
seemed to Bob that surely the lad must overshoot the mark by many yards.
But at the last instant the rider swayed backward and sidewise; the
horse set his feet, plunged mightily thrice, threw up a great cloud of
dust, and was racing back almost before the spectators could adjust
their eyes to the change of movement. Straight to the group horse and
rider raced at top speed, until the more inexperienced instinctively
ducked aside. But in time the horse sat back, slid and plunged ten feet
in a spray of dust and pine needles, to come to a quivering halt. Even
before that young Pollock had thrown himself from the saddle. Three
jerks ripped that article of furniture from its place to the earth. The
boy, with an engaging gleam of teeth, threw up both hands.
It was flash-riding, of course; but flash-riding at its best. And how
the boys enjoyed it! Now the little group of "buckeroos," heretofore
rather shyly in the background, shone forth in full glory.
"Now let's see how good you are at packing," said Thorne, when the last
man had done his best or worst. "Jack," he told young Pollock, "you go
up in the pasture and catch me up that old white pack mare. She's
warranted to stand like a rock."
While the boy was gone on this errand, Thorne rummaged the camp. Finally
he laid out on the ground about a peck of loose potatoes, miscellaneous
provisions, a kettle, frying-pan, coffee-pot, tin plates, cutlery, a
single sack of barley, a pick and shovel, and a coil of rope.
"That looks like a reasonable camp outfit," remarked Thorne. "Just throw
one of those pack saddles on her," he told Jack Pollock, who led up the
white mare. "Now you boys all retire; you mustn't have a chance to learn
from the other fellow. Hicks, you stay. Now pack that stuff on that
horse. I'll time you."
Hicks looked about him.
"Where's the kyacks?" he demanded. [Footnote: Kyacks--pack sacks slung
either side the pack saddle.]
"You don't get any kyacks," stated Thorne crisply.
"Got to pack all that stuff without 'em?"
"Sure."
Hicks set methodically to work, gathering up the loose articles,
thrusting them into sacks, lashing the sacks on the crossbuck saddle. At
the end of a half-hour, he stepped back.
"That might ride--for a while," said Thorne.
"I never pack without kyacks," said Hicks.
"So I see. Well, sit down and watch the rest of them. Ware!" Thorne
shouted.
The prospector disengaged himself from the sprawling and distant group.
"Throw those things off, and empty out those bags," ordered Thorne.
"Now, there's your camp outfit. Pack it, as fast as you can."
Ware set to work, also deliberately, it seemed. He threw a sling, packed
on his articles, and over it all drew the diamond hitch.
"Reckon that'll travel," he observed, stepping back.
"Good pack," commended Thorne briefly, as he glanced at his watch.
"Eleven minutes."
"Eleven minutes!" echoed Bob to California John, who sat near, "and the
other man took thirty-five! Impossible! Ware didn't hurry any; he moved,
if anything, slower than the other man."
"He didn't make no moves twice," pointed out California John. "He knows
how. This no-kyack business is going to puzzle plenty of those boys who
can do good, ordinary packing."
"It's near noon," Thorne was saying; "we haven't time for another of
those duffers. I'll just call up your partner, Ware, and we'll knock off
for dinner."
The partner did as well, or even a little better, for the watch credited
him with ten and one-half minutes, whereupon he chaffed Ware hugely.
Then the pack horse was led to a patiently earned feed, while the little
group of rangers, with Thorne, his sister and Bob, moved slowly toward
headquarters.
"That's all this morning, boys," he told the waiting group as they
passed it. "This afternoon we'll double up a bit. The rest of you can
all take a try at the packing, but at the same time we'll see who can
cut down a tree quickest and best."
"Stop and eat lunch with us," Amy was urging Bob. "It's only a cold
one--not even tea. I didn't want to miss the show. So it's no bother."
They all turned to and set the table under the open.
"This is great fun," said Bob gratefully, as they sat down. "Good as a
field day. When do you expect to begin your examinations? That's what
these fellows are here for, isn't it?"
He looked up to catch both Thorne and Amy looking on him with a
comically hopeless air.
"You don't mean to say!" cried Bob, a light breaking in on him. "--of
course! I never thought----"
"What do you suppose we would examine candidates for Forest Ranger
in--higher mathematics?" demanded Amy.
"Now that's practical--that's got some sense!" cried Bob
enthusiastically.
Thorne, with a whimsical smile, held up his finger for silence. Through
the thin screen of azalea bushes that fringed this open-air dining room
Bob saw two men approaching down the forest. They were evidently unaware
of observation. With considerable circumspection they drew near and
disappeared within the little tool house. Bob recognized the two
lumberjacks from his own camp.
"What are those fellows after?" he demanded indignantly.
But Thorne again motioned for caution.
"I suspect," said Thorne in a low voice. "Go on eating your lunch. We'll
see."
The men were inside the tool house for some time. When they reappeared,
each carried an axe. They looked about them cautiously. No one was in
sight. Then they thrust the axes underneath a log, and disappeared in
the direction of their own camp.
Thorne laughed aloud.
"The old foxes!" said he. "I'll bet anything you please that we'll find
the two best-balanced axes the Government owns under that log."
Such proved to be the case. Furthermore, the implements had been ground
to a razor edge.
"When I mentioned tree cutting, I saw their eyes light up," said Thorne.
"It's always interesting in a crowd of candidates like this to see every
man cheer up when his specialty comes along." He chuckled. "Wait till I
spring the written examinations on them. Then you'll see them droop."
"What else is there?" asked Bob.
"Well, I'll organize regular survey groups--compass-man, axe-man,
rod-man, chain-men--and let them run lines; and I'll make them estimate
timber, and make a sketch map or so. It's all practical."
"I should think so!" cried Bob. "I wonder if I could pass it myself." He
laughed. "I should hate to tackle tying those things on that horse--even
after seeing those prospectors do it!"
"Most of them will go a little slow. They're used to kyacks. But you'd
have your specialty."
"What would it be?" asked Amy curiously of Bob.
The young man shook his head.
"You haven't got some nice scrappy little job, have you?" he asked,
"where I can tell people to hop high? That's about all I'm good for."
"We might even have that," said Thorne, eyeing the young man's
proportions.
V
Bob saw that afternoon the chopping contest. Thorne assigned to each a
tree some eighteen or twenty inches in diameter, selecting those whose
loss would aid rather than deplete the timber stand, and also, it must
be confessed, those whose close proximity to others might make axe
swinging awkward. About twenty feet from the base of each tree he placed
upright in the earth a sharpened stake. This, he informed the axe-man,
must be driven by the fall of the tree.
As in the previous contests, three classes of performers quickly
manifested themselves--the expert, the man of workmanlike skill, and the
absolute duffer. The lumberjacks produced the implements they had that
noon so carefully ground to an edge. It was beautiful to see them at
work. To all appearance they struck easily, yet each stroke buried half
the blade. The less experienced were inclined to put a great deal of
swift power in the back swing, to throw too much strength into the
beginning of the down stroke. The lumberjacks drew back quite
deliberately, swung forward almost lazily. But the power constantly
increased, until the axe met the wood in a mighty swish and whack. And
each stroke fell in the gash of the one previous. Methodically they
opened the "kerf," each face almost as smooth as though it had been
sawn. At the finish they left the last fibres on one side or another,
according as they wanted to twist the direction of the tree's fall. Then
the trunk crashed down across the stake driven in the ground.
The mountaineers, accustomed to the use of the axe in their backwoods
work, did a workmanlike but not expert job on their respective trees.
They felled their trees accurately over the mark, and their axe work was
fairly clean, but it took them some time to finish the job.
But some of the others made heavy weather. Young Elliott was the worst.
It was soon evident that he had probably never had any but a possible
and casual wood-pile axe in his hand before. The axe rarely hit twice in
the same place; its edge had apparently no cutting power; the handle
seemed to be animated with a most diabolical tendency to twist in
mid-air. Bob, with the wisdom of the woods, withdrew to a safe distance.
The others followed.
Long after the others had finished, poor Elliott hacked away. He seemed
to have no definite idea of possible system. All he seemed to be trying
to do was to accomplish some kind of a hole in that tree. The chips he
cut away were small and ragged; the gash in the side of the tree was
long and irregular.
"Looks like somethin' had set out to _chaw_ that tree down!" drawled a
mountain man to his neighbour.
But when the tree finally tottered and crashed to the ground it fairly
centred the direction stake!
The bystanders stared; then catching the expression of ludicrous
astonishment on Elliott's face, broke into appreciative laughter.
"I'm as much surprised as you are, boys," said Elliott, showing the
palms of his hands, on which were two blisters.
"The little cuss is game, anyhow," muttered California John to Thorne.
"It was an awful job," confided the other; "but I marked him something
on it because he stayed with it so well."
Toward sunset Bob said farewell, expressing many regrets that he could
not return on the morrow to see the rest of the examinations. He rode
back through the forest, thoughtfully inclined. The first taste of the
Western joy of mere existence was passing with him. He was beginning to
look upon his life, and ask of it the why. To be sure, he could tell
himself that his day's work was well done, and that this should suffice
any man; that he was an integral part of the economic machine; that in
comparison with the average young man of his age he had made his way
with extraordinary success; that his responsibilities were sufficient to
keep him busy and happy; that men depended on him--all the reasons that
philosophy or acquiescence in the plan of life ultimately bring to a
man. But these did not satisfy the uneasiness of his spirit. He was too
young to settle down to a routine; he was too intellectually restless to
be contented with reiterations, however varied, of that which he had
seen through and around. It was the old defect--or glory--of his
character; the quality that had caused him more anxiety, more
self-reproach, more bitterness of soul than any other, the Rolling Stone
spirit that--though now he could not see it--even if it gathered no moss
of respectable achievement, might carry him far.
So as he rode he peered into the scheme of things for the final
satisfaction. In what did it lie? Not for him in mere activity, nor in
the accomplishment of the world's work, no matter how variedly
picturesque his particular share of it might be. He felt his interest
ebbing, his spirit restless at its moorings. The days passed. He arose
in the morning: and it was night! Four years ago he had come to
California. It seemed but yesterday. The days were past, gone, used. Of
it all what had he retained? The years had run like sea sands between
his fingers, and not a grain of them remained in his grasp. A little
money was there, a little knowledge, a little experience--but what
toward the final satisfaction, the justification of a man's life? Bob
was still too young, too individualistic to consider the doctrine of the
day's work well done as the explanation and justification of all. The
coming years would pass as quickly, leaving as little behind. Never so
poignantly had he felt the insistence of the _carpe diem_. It was
necessary that he find a reality, something he could winnow from the
years as fine gold from sand, so that he could lay his hand on the
treasure and say to his soul: "This much have I accomplished." Bob had
learned well the American lesson: that the idler is to be scorned; that
a true man must use his powers, must work; that he must _succeed_. Now
he was taking the next step spiritually. How does a man really use his
powers? What is success?
Troubled by this spiritual unrest, the analysis of which, even the
nature of which was still beyond him, he arrived at camp. The familiar
objects fretted on his mood. For the moment all the grateful feeling of
power over understanding and manipulating this complicated machinery of
industry had left him. He saw only the wheel in which these activities
turned, and himself bound to it. In this truly Buddhistic frame of mind
he returned to his quarters.
There, to his vague annoyance, he found Baker. Usually the liveliness of
that able young citizen was welcome, but to-night it grated.
"Well, Gentle Stranger," sang out the power man, "what jungle have you
been lurking in? I laboured in about three and went all over the works
looking for you."
"I've been over watching the ranger examinations at their headquarters,"
said Bob. "It's pretty good fun."
Baker leaned forward.
"Have you heard the latest dope?" he demanded.
"What sort?"
"They're trying to soak us, now. Want to charge us so much per horse
power! Now _what_ do you think of that!"
"Can't you pay it?" asked Bob.
"Great guns! Why _should_ we pay it?" demanded Baker. "It's the public
domain, isn't it? First they take away the settler's right to take up
public land in his own state, and now they want to _charge_, actually
_charge_ the public for what's its own."
But Bob, a new light shining in his eyes, refused to become heated.
"Well," he asked deliberately, "who _is_ the public, anyhow?"
Baker stared at him, one chubby hand on each fat knee.
"Why, everybody," said he; "the people who can make use of it. You and I
and the other fellow."
"Especially the other fellow," put in Bob drily.
Baker chuckled.
"It's like any business," said he. "First-come collect at the ticket
office for his business foresight. But we'll try out this hold-up before
we lie down and roll over."
"Why shouldn't you pay?" demanded Bob again. "You get your value, don't
you? The Forest Service protects your watershed, and that's where you
get your water. Why shouldn't you pay for that service, just the same as
you pay for a night watchman at your works?"
"Watershed!" snorted Baker. "Rot! If every stick of timber was cleaned
off these mountains, I'd get the water just the same."[A]
"Baker," said Bob to this. "You go and take a long, long look at your
bathroom sponge in action, and then come back and I'll talk to you."
Baker contemplated his friend for a full ten seconds. Then his fat,
pugnacious face wrinkled into a grin.
"Stung on the ear by a wasp!" he cried, with a great shout of
appreciation. "You merry, merry little josher! You had me going for
about five minutes."
Bob let it go at that.
"I suppose you won't be able to pay over twenty per cent. this next
year, then?" he inquired, with an amused expression.
"Twenty per cent.!" cried Baker rolling his eyes up. "It's as much as I
can do to dig up for improvements and bond interest and the preferred."
"Not to mention the president's salary," amended Bob.
"But I've got 'em where they live," went on Baker, complacently, without
attention to this. "You don't catch Little Willie scattering shekels
when he can just as well keep kopecks. They've left a little joker in
the pack." He produced a paper-covered copy of the new regulations,
later called the Use Book. "They've swiped about everything in sight for
these pestiferous reserves, but they encourage the honest prospector.
'Let us develop the mineral wealth,' says they. So these forests are
still open for taking up under the mineral act. All you have to do is to
make a 'discovery,' and stake out your claim; and there you are!"
"All the mineral's been taken up long ago," Bob pointed out.
"All the valuable mineral," corrected Baker. "But it's sufficient, so
Erbe tells me, to discover a ledge. Ledges? Hell! They're easier to find
than an old maid at a sewing circle! That's what the country is made
of--ledges! You can dig one out every ten feet. Well, I've got people
out finding ledges, and filing on them."
"Can you do that?" asked Bob.
"I am doing it."
"I mean legally."
"Oh, this bunch of prospectors files on the claims, and gets them
patented. Then it's nobody's business what they do with their own
property. So they just sell it to me."
"That's colonizing," objected Bob. "You'll get nailed."
"Not on your tintype, it isn't. I don't furnish a cent. They do it all
on their own money. Oldham's got the whole matter in hand. When we get
the deal through, we'll have about two hundred thousand acres all around
the head-waters; and then these blood-sucking, red-tape, autocratic
slobs can go to thunder."
Baker leaned forward impressively.
"Got to spring it all at once," said he, "otherwise there'll be
outsiders in, thinking there's a strike been made--also they'll get
inquisitive. It's a great chance. And, Orde, my son, there's a few
claims up there that will assay about sixty thousand board feet to the
acre. What do you think of it for a young and active lumberman? I'm
going to talk it over with Welton. It's a grand little scheme. Wonder
how that will hit our old friend, Thorne?"
Bob rose yawning.
"I'm tired. Going to turn in," said he. "Thorne isn't a bad sort."
"He's one of these damn theorists, that's what he is," said Baker; "and
he's got a little authority, and he's doing just as much as he can to
unsettle business and hinder the legitimate development of the country."
He relaxed his earnestness with another grin. "Stung again. That's two
rises you got out of me," he remarked. "Say, Orde, don't get persuaded
to turn ranger. I hear they've boosted their salaries to ninety a month.
Must be a temptation!"
[Footnote A: Extraordinary as it may seem to the modern reader, this
sentiment--or this ignorance--was at that time sincerely entertained by
men as influential, as powerful, and as closely interested in water
power as Baker is here depicted.]