WE both cleaned up a bit and went out to dinner. I found he had done a
good deal of planning. He knew what he wanted but did not know exactly
how to get it. He was firm in the plan of getting the saw-mill we had
seen in the unclaimed freight house onto the deck of the _Fearsome_ and
going up the river for the double purpose of making lumber from the
"floaters," but most of all to have an excuse for getting into Becker &
Co.'s plant. He was very sober most of the time, even morose, but
occasionally his youthful buoyancy and humor would break out in the most
surprising and delightful way.
We canvassed the details of using the motor to run the saw, and decided
that we would try it the next day.
"But, Hiram, suppose the timber people insist on your going back for
another load? They can force you."
"They know, or think, we are still tied up with litigation.
Besides--can't you explain to some one--a few days will turn the
trick," he reasoned. "After we get Becker we may want to see them as
badly as they want to see us," he added, with an eye for the main
chance.
"Hiram, have you seen or heard from Anna Bell Morgan?" I asked suddenly
to surprise him.
"No, I haven't--but as the time approaches--and you know it is
coming--when I can go back to her with clean hands, I feel as though I
can hardly contain myself. That's what keeps me up and doing; of course,
I want to make out the Gold-Beater as a damned poor prophet about my
future, but the main thing is her. Do you know, I actually feel her
beside me urging me on and making me do things. It will be my happiest
day when I can go back to her clean--actually clean." While he spoke he
was digging away at the remnants of the great steak he had consumed, and
for the first time I saw the harbingers of real manhood as he looked at
me through eyes unabashed and unashamed.
The next day was a very busy one. He collected his freight and we moved
the _Fearsome_ to dock near the unclaimed freight house. I arranged with
Superintendent Kitchell by telephone to take the sawmill, and by night
it was bolted to the deck, with power from the motor applied. A derrick
with outrigging, so that a log could be grappled and brought to the deck
by power, and laid on the saw carriage to be solidly locked down for its
terrible shining fangs that become invisible in full career, moving
through a dirty, slimy log.
"Yes," Superintendent Kitchell had said to me when I asked him about my
clerk, "I have taken Miss Bascom into my private office and found work
for her there--perfectly safe any time you want her," he assured me,
after getting a brief account of our progress.
At the first sign of daylight the next morning we left the dock with our
queer looking craft and started up the river. Through an employment
agency Hiram had secured three additional men, a sawyer and two
laborers.
Hiram's interest amounted to intense excitement when the first log was
cut. He had waited until he saw an unusually promising one go through.
One of the laborers rowed to it, fastened the grapples and it seemed to
want to come aboard, as though tired of life in the river, and there it
lay quietly, without one flinch before the saw that passed through it.
The sawyer understood his business, four slab cuts were made skillfully,
the log squared and finally reduced to wide, clean, inch boards and
stored below in less than ten minutes. Hiram found it hard to contain
himself. His intense joy and elation threatened his dignity. He had made
something useful, valuable, beautiful, with the delicate odor of the
spring woods, from hitherto waste material. I knew what would have
happened had we been alone. He would have tried to throw on me his now
brawny person and pummel me from sheer exuberance.
"Ben," he said, in a tense undertone, "over five hundred feet of lumber
in that log that they will mob us to get at five cents a foot." I knew
he wanted to cut a big caper and cavort. "Twenty-five dollars, Ben, in
less than ten minutes. Say, if Becker don't fall for cheap lumber--well,
we'll get him sure with such bait, and the bayou back of his place is
full of logs--we won't be there an hour before he comes for it--just you
watch. We can be there by to-morrow morning," he went on, his eyes
roaming the river on both sides for another good log that had eluded
the lumber men in the long reaches of the Mississippi as far back as the
Great Lakes.
That night we tied up at a bank across the river and a little below
Becker & Co.'s plant. It had been a busy day and every one except Hiram
was tired and glad to stop for supper. I was sitting aft smoking when I
noticed him come up from below, looking for me.
"I've been down taking stock and checking up the day," he began,
squatting down before me on his heels, keeping his pipe in his mouth.
"We captured just thirty-nine logs, you know a few of them had rotten
centers, but we've got over twenty thousand feet of clear lumber besides
nearly three thousand feet of culls. Figure it out at fifty
dollars--it's worth more delivered--eleven hundred dollars--first
day--all amateurs--we've got the big idea working."
"Why do you say we, Hiram? I claim no credit or interest or wages; I'm
paid--it is your plan--don't be so modest."
"Yes, I did get the idea of capturing this waste, but how far would I
have got alone--a hundred and twenty-five dollars per from the railroad
and a certainty of being accused of stealing. In a thousand years I
never will be charged with ingratitude--if we win, you've got----"
"The weak spot, Hiram, is that you will soon clean the river of logs,
and then what? Sit still and wait for the once-a-year highwater to bring
them down?" I asked, interrupting him purposely.
"Wait till we get Becker over there," he said, suddenly sobering and
looking across the river, but making no other sign--something as a wolf
looks at his prey within easy reach. "It's a hundred and fifty miles
from here to the Gulf and lots of logs all the way. But with our big job
done, once get actually free, and we run out of logs, something will
turn up; in fact I've got another idea hatching. Do you see the
foundation he has started over there? That's why he must have lumber.
Doesn't his plant remind you of a quarantine station--or a pest house?"
He asked this question as though he did not expect an answer.