When the autocrat of the Noda strode away, a stalwart young man
instantly obeyed Flagg's command--seizing the occasion to follow then
and there. He had been standing on the outskirts of the throng,
surveying the happenings with great interest. The men who were in his
immediate vicinity, lumberjacks who were strangers in the Noda region,
were plainly of his appanage and had obeyed his advice to keep out of
the melee that had been provoked by Flagg's methods of selection.
When the big fellow hurried in pursuit of Flagg a bystander put a
question to one of the strangers.
"You ought to know who he is," returned the questioned. "That's Ward
Latisan."
And just then, apart from the crowd, having overtaken the autocrat, the
young man was informing Flagg to that same effect.
Flagg halted, swung around, and rammed his cant dog into the ground.
"You've changed from a sapling into fair-sized timber since I saw you
last. You look like old John, and that's compliment enough, I reckon.
How do you happen to be over in the Noda country?"
"I don't happen! I heard of the word you sent out. I came here on
purpose, sir."
"What for?"
"To hire with you."
Flagg looked Latisan up and down and showed no enthusiasm. "Yes, I heard
that you and your father had let the Three C's slam you flat. And what
makes you think I want that kind of a quitter in my crew?"
Ward met the disparaging stare with a return display of undaunted
challenge. "Because I belong in the crew of a man who is proposing to
fight the Three C's."
Flagg grunted.
Latisan kept on. "You have been hiring men because they have been
parading a lot of little grouches against the Comas folks. You need a
man who has a real reason for going up against that outfit. And I'm the
man."
"What you think about yourself and what I may think about you are two
different things," retorted Flagg, with insolence. "Looks to me like you
had got the Big Laugh over in your section. You have probably noticed
what I just did in a case of that sort."
"I took it all in, sir."
"Well, what then?"
"They are not laughing with us or against us over in the Tomah, Mr.
Flagg. They all know what happened, and that we fought the Comas fair
and square as long as we could keep on our feet. It was a trick that
licked us. Craig held out the Walpole heir on us."
"I know about it; I manage to get most of the news." Flagg started to go
on his way, but Ward put his clutch on the autocrat's arm.
"Pardon me, Mr. Flagg, but you're going to hear what I have to ask of
you."
Mere apologetic suit would not have served with Flagg. He found this
bold young man patterning after the Flagg methods in dealings with men.
The boldness of the grip on his arm gained more effectively than
pleading.
"Ask it. I'm in a hurry."
"You have fired Kyle. I want his place."
"Well, I'll be----"
"You needn't be, sir. I'm a Latisan and I have bossed our drives. I have
brought along a bunch of my own men who have bucked white water with me
and are with me now in standing up for the principle of the
independents. Allow me to say that luck is with you. Here's your chance
to get hold of a man who can put heart and soul into this fight you're
going to make."
"And now go on and tell me how much you admire me," suggested Flagg,
sarcastically.
"I can't do that, sir. I'm going to tell you frankly I don't relish what
I have heard about you. It's for no love of you that I'm asking for a
chance to go up against the Comas people. It's because you're hard--hard
enough to suit me--hard enough to let me go to it and show the Three C's
they can't get away with what they're trying to do up here through Rufus
Craig."
"All right. You're hired. You've got Ben Kyle's job," stated Flagg.
Latisan was not astonished by this precipitate come-about. He was
prepared for Flagg's tactics by what he had set himself to learn about
the autocrat's nature--quick to adjudge, tenacious in his grudges,
inflexible in his opinion, bitterly ruthless when he had set himself in
the way his prejudices selected.
"You have seen what happened to Kyle. Can you govern yourself
accordingly?" Flagg in his turn had set his grip on Ward's arm.
"Yes, sir!"
"I'll kick you out just as sudden as I kicked him if anything happens to
make men give you the grin. Can you start north with me in the morning?"
"Now or in the morning; it makes no difference to me, sir."
Flagg shifted his hand from Ward's arm to the young man's shoulder and
propelled him back a few paces toward the crowd in front of the tavern.
"Listen, one and all! Here's my drive boss. He's old John Latisan's
grandson. If that isn't introduction enough, ask questions about old
John from those who remember him; this chap is like his grandfather."
Latisan went into the tavern after Flagg had marched away to the big
house on the ledges. The crowd made way for the new drive boss; those in
his path stared at him with interest; mumble of comment followed as the
men closed in behind him. When he sat down in a corner of the tavern
office and lighted his pipe his subalterns showed him deference by
leaving him to himself. That isolation gave Landlord Brophy his
opportunity to indulge his bent in gossip unheard by interlopers.
Brophy plucked a cigar from a box in the little case on the desk and sat
down beside Ward. "I sympathize with you," he said by way of backhanded
congratulation.
"Thank you."
"I was born in this tavern; my father built it and run it before me,"
said Brophy, tucking his cigar through the shrubbery of his gray
mustache. "And so I've had the chance to know Ech Flagg a good many
years. He's a turk."
"I have heard so."
"He has always had a razor edge to his temper. Maybe you know what put
the wire edge onto it?" It was query with the cock of an eyebrow
accompanying.
"What I know about Mr. Flagg is only a general reputation of being a
hard man. I can say that much to you because I told him the same thing.
And that's as far as I care to gossip about an employer," stated Ward,
stiffly.
"That's a safe stand," said Brophy, unperturbed. "Keep to it and they
can't be running to him with stories about what you have said. But he
don't pay me wages and I can say what I feel like saying. A new boss
ought to know a few things about the man who hires him. It's my
disposition to set a good chap on the right road with a tip. Whatever
you may say to Flagg in the way of chat, don't you ever try to bring up
the subject of his family affairs."
"I'm not at all likely to," snapped Latisan, with asperity.
"Oh, such a subject is easy out when folks get to going confidential,"
pursued the persistent Brophy. The suggestion that he would ever be on
confidential terms with Flagg provoked an ill-tempered rebuke from Ward,
but Brophy paid no attention.
"If you lose your job with him, as you probably will, Latisan, let it
be in the straight way of business, as he conducts it, instead of being
by some fool slip of your tongue about family matters." He puffed at his
cigar complacently and still was giving no heed to Ward's manifest
repugnance at being made the repository of gossip.
"Eck's wife died when the daughter Sylvia was small, and he sent the
girl off to school somewheres when she was big enough to be sent. And
she fell in with a dude kind of a fellow and came back home married to
him. She was so much in love that she dared to do a thing like that with
Eck Flagg--and that's being in love a whole lot, I'll say. Well, none of
us knew what was said back and forth in the family circle, but we
figured that the new husband's cheeks didn't tingle with any kisses that
Eck gave him. At any rate, Eck set Kennard to work--that was the name,
Alfred Kennard. Eck was never much good at ciphering. Office had been in
his hip pocket, where he carried his timebook and his scale sheet.
Kennard had an education and it came about that Eck let Alf do the
ciphering; then he let him keep the books; then he let him handle
contracts and the money; then he gave him power of attorney so that Alf
wouldn't be hampered whilst Eck was away in the woods. Just handed
everything over for the first and the only time in his life, figuring
that it was all in the family. I guess that Alf went to figuring the
same way, seeing that he was good at figures; felt that what was Eck's
was his, or would be later--and Alf proceeded to cash in. Stole right
and left, that was the amount of it. Prob'ly reckoned he'd rather have
a sore conscience than have his feelings all ripped to pieces when he
asked Eck for money.
"We all knew when Eck found out that he had been properly trimmed by the
only man he had ever trusted.
"It happened in the dooryard of the big house up there, when Eck came
home, wised up, and tackled Alf. Eck felt that the inside of the house
might get mussed up by his language, so he stood in the yard and
hollered for Alf to come out. We all went up and stood around; it seemed
to be a free show, all welcome. We got the full facts in the case from
Eck.
"Sylvia came out on the heels of Alf, and she had with her the little
Lida, Eck's granddaughter. And after Eck had had his say to Alf and had
thrown him over the fence, he gave Sylvia her choice--stay with her
father or go away with Alf. Well, she had loved Alf well enough to come
home and face Eck with him; she loved Alf enough to turn her back on Eck
and face the world with her husband. Natural, of course! Eck tried to
grab the little girl away--to save his own from the thieves, so he said.
Sylvia fought him off and hung to the girl. It was a tough sight,
Latisan! And he stood there and shook his fists and cast 'em all off for
ever and aye. That's his nature--no allowance made if anybody does him
dirt.
"I'll admit that Eck did make an allowance later, after Alf died and the
news of it got back here to Adonia. Lida was grown up to around sixteen
by that time. I got this from Rickety Dick. Know him?"
Latisan, relighting his pipe, shook his head with an indifferent wag.
"Well, you soon will. He cooks and waits and tends on Eck. Looks up to
Eck. Loves Eck--and that's going some! Dick told me about the allowance
Eck made for once in his life after I had touched Dick up by telling him
that Eck Flagg never made an allowance to anybody. Eck allowed to Dick
that Lida was too young to choose the right way that day in the yard.
When she had grown up Eck sent old Dick to hunt for her in the city, to
tell her she could come back to him, now that she was old enough to make
her choice. Said Sylvia couldn't come back. Now that was a devil of a
position to put a girl in. What? Hey?"
Latisan nodded, displaying faint interest.
"And Sylvia right then was in bed with her never-get-over, so Dick told
me. Of course Lida wouldn't come back. And she was working her fingers
to the bone to take care of her mother. Old Dick cried like a baby when
he was telling me. He cries pretty easy, anyway. He never dared to give
to Eck the word that Lida sent back. She's got the spirit of the Flaggs,
so I judge from what Dick told me. She wouldn't even take the eggs and
the truck Dick lugged down, though Dick had bought 'em with his own
money; she thought the stuff came from her grandfather. Dick had to hide
'em under the table when he came away. And so Eck has crossed Lida off
for ever and aye. Now that's some story, ain't it?"
"I haven't enjoyed it," said Ward, brusquely.
"Prob'ly not. I wasn't telling it thinking you'd give three cheers when
I finished. But I've been warning you not to make a foolish break by
stubbing your toe over the family topic. I've heard what has happened to
the Latisans over Tomah way. You're our real sort, and I'm blasted sorry
for you. I reckon you need a job and I'm trying to help you hold it. I
like your looks, young Latisan. I hate the Comas crowd. Craig has never
set down to my table but what he has growled about the grub. The cheap
rowdies he hires for his operations on these waters come through here
with bootleg booze and try to wreck my house. I'd like to be friends
with you, young Latisan, and if you feel that way about it, put it
there!"
Brophy held out a fat hand and Latisan grasped it cordially.
"In my position I hear all the news," stated the landlord. "I'll sift
the wheat out of the chaff and hand you what's for your own good. And
now you'll have to excuse me whilst I go and pound steak and dish up
dinner and wait on the table. That's the trouble with running a tavern
up here in the woods. I can't keep help of the girl kind. They either
get homesick or get married."
There was an ominous crash in the dining room.
Brophy swore roundly and extricated his rotund haunches from the arms of
his chair. "There goes Dirty-Shirt Sam! I have to double him as hostler
and waiter. He'd smash the feed pails in the stable if they wasn't
galvanized iron."
He pounded with heavy gait across the office and flung open the
dining-room door, disclosing a lop-sided youth who was listlessly
kicking broken dishes into a pile.
"You're fourteen dollars behind your wages, already, with dishes you've
dropped and smashed," shouted Brophy. "I'd give a thousand dollars for
the right kind of a girl to stay here and wait on tables if she wouldn't
get married or homesick. I'll make it a standing offer." He cuffed the
youth in a circle around the heap of broken crockery and went on his way
to the kitchen.
Latisan smoked and reflected on the nature of Echford Flagg as Brophy
had exposed it from the family standpoint.
Then he looked at the sullen youth who was sweeping up the fragments of
the dishes. The whimsical notion occurred to Ward that he might post
Brophy on the advantages of a cafeteria plan of operating his hostelry.
But he had by these thoughts summoned the memory of one certain
cafeteria, and of a handsome girl who sat across from him and who had so
suddenly been swallowed up in the vortex of the city throngs--gone
forever--only a memory that troubled him so much and so often that he
was glad when his own Tomah men appeared to him, asking for commands and
taking his mind off a constantly nagging regret.