Chapter XXI
A Trouble Maker
Pull foot early they did, too. Charley himself was no sluggard, but the forester's capacity for work simply amazed him. He knew the forester was on the job late every night, for he reported to him each night the last thing before he went to bed. Yet whenever the forester spent the night with Charley, Mr. Marlin was up at an early hour; and the present occasion proved no exception.
Mr. Marlin had never said much about himself to Charley, and no one else had happened to do so; but Mr. Marlin had worked himself up from the ranks. He had been a fire patrol and later a ranger, and then had attended the state forestry school, as the other district foresters had done.
His unusual training, great diligence, intelligence, and untiring energy had made him one of the ablest men in the service. By sheer ability he had won for himself the oversight of this district, which was one of the most important in the entire million acres of state forest lands.
Hardly was the forester afoot this morning before he had a fire going and breakfast cooking. Before breakfast was ready, the two forest guardians began to strike camp. Charley took down his wireless and stowed it as compactly as possible. The tent was lowered and rolled up. Everything was gotten into portable shape, and as soon as breakfast was over, the dishes were washed and they, too, were added to the bundles.
"I don't care to let anybody know where your camp was," said the forester. "I may want to use this site again. So we'll have to pack our stuff out ourselves, at least part of the way. I am going to put a crew of men in here to-morrow and they can finish carrying out the duffel if we cave in before we reach the road. It will be a pretty good load."
Each of them strapped a big pack to his back. The rifle and the fishing-rod had been fastened to the battery, which in turn was roped to poles for handles. In this way it was possible for the two to carry all Charley's outfit. By sun-up the two were already on the trail. They toiled up the slope and crossed the ridge close to Charley's watch-tower. The way was rough and the going hard. But once they struck a fire trail, the path was easy. Yet at best it was a hard and toilsome hike, and several hours elapsed before they reached the forester's motor-car, which he had concealed in the pines. Both of them were tired, and Charley felt as though his arms were about ready to part from his shoulders.
Most of their journey had been made in silence. But now that they were seated comfortably in a motor-car, they once more began to talk.
"I had to bring you in from the forest, Charley," explained Mr. Marlin, "because as a ranger it will be necessary for you often to be at headquarters. I have arranged for you to live with Ranger Lumley. His district adjoins yours, and his house, right in the forest, is near the dividing line. So it will be about as convenient for you as it is for him. He is to be at the office to meet us and look after you. We'll pick him up and go on to his house with your things."
Ranger Lumley was on hand as the forester had said he would be. Charley had found Ranger Morton and his wife so likable that he was glad indeed of the opportunity to become acquainted with this second ranger. But the minute he laid eyes on him, he felt a chill of disappointment. Yet he could not have told exactly why. Somewhere, too, he felt sure, he had seen the man before; though he could not remember when or where.
Lumley was a man small of stature, with a hooked nose, fishy blue eyes, a thin, hard mouth, and a face seamed and wrinkled. Yet he was quite evidently not an old man. Charley had noticed that some of the tough characters in his home town looked like that, and the more he studied Ranger Lumley's face, the less he liked the man. Particularly did he dislike his eye. Once he caught the ranger looking at him slyly, and the gleam in the ranger's eye reminded Charley of the vicious look of a horse when he shows the white of his eye. It seemed to Charley, too, as though there was something suggestive of craftiness and cunning in the man's countenance.
When they reached the Lumley home, Charley felt his dislike for the man increasing. Unlike the neat and attractive dwelling of the Mortons, the Lumley house was dirty and disorderly. The children were unclean and ragged. They had no manners whatever. Yet they obeyed readily enough when their father spoke to them. But it did not take Charley long to discover that they obeyed because of fear. When he realized that, he thought of the vicious look he had noted in the ranger's eye. There were dogs innumerable about the place, and they all slunk away when their master approached. Yet all the time, as he showed Charley about, the ranger was almost obsequious. This evident contradiction between the man's actions and his looks made Charley distrust him immediately, and it was with heavy heart that he said good-bye to Mr. Marlin and watched him drive away.
The ranger showed Charley to the room that was to be his. Charley began to carry his luggage up-stairs. He would much rather have taken it all himself, but the ranger insisted upon helping him. When Charley saw how the man eyed every package and scrutinized every article, he understood quickly enough that Lumley wanted to help him, not because of any wish to be courteous, but simply because of his burning curiosity. Especially was the ranger curious about Charley's wireless outfit, but Charley volunteered no information.
The more Charley considered his situation, the gloomier he felt concerning it. He had looked forward to his coming, after Mr. Marlin had told him of the arrangement, with a feeling of pleasant anticipation. Charley was not the least bit shy and made friends readily. He had a feeling that all the men in the Forest Service must be pretty fine men and that their interest in their work would make them, like Mr. Marlin and Mr. Morton, eager to help a recruit. Thus Charley had believed that Lumley would be very helpful to him. He had intended to put himself more or less in Lumley's hands and trust to the ranger for guidance. But a very few minutes spent with Lumley made Charley feel that he could not take the man into his confidence. He almost felt as though he dared not, though when he came to consider the matter fully, that attitude seemed foolish. Lumley was a guardian of the forest as well as himself, and surely he could trust him with matters that pertained to the forest.
Charley tried to fight down this feeling of distrust. It seemed to him very wrong to accept a man's hospitality, even if he was to pay well for it, and at the same time be suspicious of the man. But hardly had he decided that he ought to be frank with his fellow ranger when Lumley began asking questions that caused the feeling of distrust to return with renewed force. Lumley's questions were intended to seem innocent enough; but Charley was sharper than he perhaps looked, and he saw the real intent behind the questions. The man was slyly trying to find out all he could about Charley's history, and particularly how much Charley had been paid as a fire patrol and what he was to get as a ranger.
Charley answered most of Lumley's questions openly enough, but could not tell him what he was to get as a ranger, for he had never once thought about the matter, nor had Mr. Marlin mentioned it. But when Charley told Lumley so, he could see that the ranger did not believe him.
When the ranger began to question Charley about his recent work in the woods, Charley answered him evasively. Lumley knew that Charley had been acting as fire patrol, because Mr. Marlin had told him so. But Charley felt very sure he did not know where the secret camp had been pitched, for Mr. Marlin had distinctly said that matter was a secret between Charley and himself. So Charley answered him evasively and soon turned the conversation to other matters.
While Charley was arranging his duffel, two or three dirty youngsters came bouncing into the room and at once began to drag Charley's wireless apparatus from the pasteboard box. With a cry Charley sprang toward them and snatched the instruments out of their hands. The ranger gave a savage oath and aimed a kick at the lads, but they dodged and ran from the room.
At first Charley was terribly annoyed. But in a second he was glad the incident had happened. Nothing had been injured and he had had a warning of what might be expected. It gave him a good opportunity to shut up his things without seeming to be suspicious of his host. Charley acted at once.
"I have no need of this wireless outfit at present," he said, "and if you have a spare box and some nails, I will just nail these things up until I have time to set up the outfit." So the wireless instruments were safely boxed up and locked in a closet, along with Charley's rifle and fishing-rod. There was nothing in his remaining luggage that could be much harmed, even if the youngsters did get hold of things.
As soon as his belongings were stowed away, Charley decided that he would go to the forester's office and talk over his work. He had three miles to walk, and although he had already trudged several times that distance, heavily loaded, he did not hesitate for a moment. When Lumley suggested that he use the telephone and avoid the walk, Charley merely smiled.
"I don't mind it," he said.
"I'd like to see myself walk that distance for any such fool errand," growled the ranger.
When Charley had said he didn't mind the walk he had told the truth. Yet he had understated it. The fact was that he hugely enjoyed the walk. He was rested from his long carry, and with nothing to weight him down, his feet felt light as feathers. He trudged briskly along the smooth highway, every sense alive to the delights of the forest. All about him the woods were vocal with the calls of birds. The wind whispered and sighed in the pine tops. And sometimes, when the air in the bottom was still as sluggish water, Charley could hear the wind roaring among the trees far up on the hillsides. The scent of spring was in the air--that indescribable mixture of the smell of opening buds and flowers and green things and rank steaming earth, that together make such an intoxicating odor. And all about him Charley caught glimpses of the wild life of the forest.
It was late in the day when he reached the forester's office. The forester seemed greatly surprised to see him.
"I came to talk to you about my work," explained Charley.
The forester frowned. "What is the telephone for?" he asked a bit brusquely.
"I didn't want to talk over my business before that man," protested Charley.
The forester looked at him sharply. "What business do you have excepting the business of the forest?" he asked.
"None," said Charley.
"Then surely you could discuss forest matters in the presence of a ranger."
"It may be that I am unreasonable," said Charley, "but I don't like that man. There's something about him that I don't trust."
The forester looked at Charley searchingly. "Sometimes," he said, "I almost feel that way myself. I realize that Lumley is mouthy and inquisitive and disagreeable personally, but he has been in the Forest Service a long time and it hardly seems right not to trust him. He's a pretty efficient ranger."
"Well, I'm here, anyway," continued Charley. "I came to find out what my first duties are to be and how to do them."
"There's a little tree planting that simply must be done in your territory, late though it is," said Mr. Marlin. "To-morrow I shall send you out with a small crew to do it."
"Please show me just how it ought to be done," said Charley.
The forester smiled with approval. "Come out-of-doors," he said, picking up a mattock. And he led the way to a bed of seedling spruces that had been heeled in the ground, and dug up two or three of them.
"These ought to be lifted in small bunches and their roots puddled," he said, dipping the earth-covered roots in water to show how to puddle them. "They should be planted thus." He struck his mattock sharply into the soil, bent it to one side, and in the hole thus opened thrust a tiny tree. Then he stepped on the ground close to the seedling and pressed the earth tight about it.
"That's all there is to it," he said. "Your crew will work in pairs, one man carrying the trees in a pail of water and inserting them in the ground, while the other man carries the mattock and opens the holes. The trees should be planted in straight rows and about four feet apart each way. You will have to go ahead of the crew and set up the line pole. Pick out some trees or saplings to sight by and you will have no trouble to keep your line straight."
"Is that all?"
"You'll have to oversee the work, of course. Make sure the planting is done right, and watch your men. You will have to take whatever steps seem necessary to keep them working well and cheerfully. Sometimes it is a good thing to switch a man from one job to another. It rests him to use another set of muscles."
"What else am I to do?"
"Day after to-morrow I want you to brush out the fire trails leading to your old camp. That is, you must start brushing them out. It will take several days. They are so overgrown now that they are a real menace to the forest. These trails were originally five feet wide. We took out all the roots and underground growths down to mineral soil. You must cut away all the brush that has grown in, chop it into short lengths, and pile it in little piles in the trail itself for burning on windless days. You must grub out the roots that have grown in, too. Really the entire trail ought to be grubbed again, but we can't do that now. You will have to assign men to cut brush, to pile it, and to grub up the roots. That's about all I can tell you."
"It sounds very easy," said Charley, "but I am willing to confess that handling these tough looking mountaineers is more than I counted on."
"Are you going to quit so soon?" asked the forester with scorn. "I thought you had more stuff in you than that, Charley."
Charley turned red. "Who said anything about quitting?" he demanded. "I only want to know what I am to do if I get into trouble with the men."
"That's more than I can tell you. It's up to you as a ranger to find the ways to manage your men. But I can tell you this. It is always best to follow Mr. Roosevelt's plan and speak softly but carry a big stick. Be kind to the men. Be square with them. Play no favorites. Look after their interest. But don't let them loaf on the job. They expect to have to work, and they won't have much respect for a man who doesn't hold them to their task. After all, they are not very different from horses. They have to be driven if they are to work."
"I suspect some of them will be hard to drive," said Charley, "if the few I have seen hereabout are good samples."
"It all depends upon how you get started with them. Don't let them get away with you. Let them know you are the boss. And remember this: as a ranger you have power to hire and fire these men. If it comes to a show-down, don't hesitate to fire a man. We're short-handed, but we can much better afford to lose a laborer than to have an entire crew spoiled."
"Thank you," said Charley. "I feel better already. If you don't mind, I'm coming to you before each new job and get you to show me exactly how it should be done. A fellow can get along so much better if he really knows what he is talking about."
"Good boy," smiled the forester. "I don't believe I am going to be disappointed in you, Charley."
Charley shook the forester's hand and started back to his new habitation, which he reached just as supper was ready.
After supper he and the ranger talked about the forest. Or rather Lumley did. He was so loquacious that Charley soon stopped talking and let his companion carry on the conversation alone. Lumley was quite able to do it, for he was truly, as Mr. Marlin had described him, mouthy. He had something to say about everything, and what he had to say was usually of a derogatory character. He was guarded in what he said about Mr. Marlin, yet Charley saw that he was trying to damn the forester by faint praise.
"You may make a good ranger in time all right," he said bluntly to Charley, "but it seems mighty funny to me to take a raw high school boy and put him in charge of the finest stand of timber in the entire forest. I'm the man that post ought to go to. Besides, I have a greater interest in that timber than any one else."
Charley choked back his resentment at the statement about himself and asked, "Why have you a greater interest in that timber than any one else?"
"Because our family used to own that timber," he said, sudden passion inflaming his eyes. And Charley once more saw in them that savage look he had detected before. "If my old fool of a grandfather hadn't let himself be bilked out of the whole holding," he said coarsely, "I'd own that timber to-day and I'd be a millionaire instead of a poor forest-ranger. By rights the land is mine, anyway." And again the ranger swore at his dead ancestor.
Charley listened in disgust but made no comment. The ranger saw that he had talked too much. He muttered an apology. "When I see somebody else getting the money that ought to be mine," he said, "it makes me so mad that I could almost commit murder." Then he quickly changed the conversation and once more became the smooth, oily individual he was when Charley first saw him.
But Charley had seen and heard enough to be utterly disgusted with the man. As early as possible he got away to his room on the pretext of weariness, but it was a long time before he went to bed.
Early next morning he was at headquarters, where Mr. Marlin introduced him to the half dozen men who were to serve under him. Ordinarily ten men would form a unit for planting, but Charley did not know that, and so was ignorant of the fact that Mr. Marlin had tried to make his first day of authority easy and successful by giving him only a few selected men to handle. Mr. Marlin introduced Charley to the men one by one, as they came in. Charley tried to talk to them, but found it rather difficult. The mountaineers had little to say.
When the men were all on hand, Mr. Marlin turned to them and said, "By the way, men, this is the lad who saved Morton's life."
At the mention of the sick ranger, Charley saw the men's faces light up.
"He's a little young yet, but he knows his business. Jim says he handled the snake-bite as well as any doctor could have done. I want you all to be good to this lad and help him as much as you can."
Now they had found something in common to talk about. All day long, at intervals, the crew discussed rattlers; and Charley told them, at their request, just how the ranger was bitten and what had been done to save him.
"You see," he said, "the danger from snake-bite comes when the poison reaches the heart. So it is necessary to suck as much of it out as possible and to prevent the remainder from reaching the heart except a little at a time. That's why the bandages were put on the arm so tight. The old notion of taking a stimulant was all wrong. The thing to do is to keep the heart beating as slowly as possible until the venom reaches it. Then if it begins to slow up, give a stimulant."
This suggestion was contrary to all forest practice and Charley could see that the men were greatly interested in it. How much his recital about the snake contributed to his success that day he never realized. He kept his lines straight, switched his men from one task to another, now relieved this man or that, and did his work in such a highly efficient manner that he would have had no trouble anyway; but at intervals all through the day the men reverted to the rattlesnake story. They were so busy thinking about something else they almost forgot about Charley.
But the next day had a different tale to tell. The forester had increased Charley's crew by four men, and a tougher looking lot Charley had never seen. Rough, rugged, reckless mountaineers, there was not one of them who could not have picked Charley up and broken him in half with ease. And one of them, a tall, surly fellow, was quite evidently bent on making trouble.
Charley's knees almost shook under him when he faced the crew and realized that it was up to him to command and control these men. Also he knew that he was lost if he showed any hesitation. The instant the party reached the trail, therefore, Charley seized an axe.
"Let's get at it, men," he said, starting work himself.
"What do you want us to do?" asked the tall, surly looking chap. The others gathered round to see what Charley would say. And Charley realized that he was on trial with the men.
"You heard what the forester said," he replied pleasantly. "We're to brush this trail out. I want it made as good as it was when it was first completed. Mr. Marlin said you were a mighty good crew and knew your business thoroughly. So you don't need any instructions from me."
Evidently the reply tickled the men. Charley saw one or two of them nudge their fellows and chuckle; and all of them looked slyly in the direction of the man who had asked the question. Charley judged that the fellow was trying to make game of him and that the crew thought Charley had come out on top. Charley did not mean to lose this slight initial advantage.
With his axe he began briskly chopping away the brush along the sides of the trail. Here and there he noticed little bushes that had sprung up in the trail itself.
"I wish you would take a mattock," he said to the man nearest him, "and grub out all the plants in the trail. Take out all the roots and get everything clean down to mineral soil." To the others he said: "We'll chop up the brush fine and pile it right in the trail to burn on windless days."
The crew fell to with a will and the work went forward briskly. Presently they reached a place where the trail was badly overgrown. Charley assigned two more men to grub up roots. He was learning fast. Most of the time he worked at the head of the gang, so he could see what was ahead, and be prepared for any new situation that arose. But from time to time he walked back among the crew to see that the work was being done right.
Evidently the crew liked the way Charley was taking hold. They worked cheerfully and skilfully. That is, all did with the exception of the tall, surly fellow. He seemed bent on annoying Charley, but Charley paid no attention to him. At last, however, a situation arose that he dared not overlook. The trail had originally been five feet wide, but the bushes, crowding in on either side, had greatly narrowed it. The main reason for brushing out this trail at this time was to widen it again to its original size so as to make it an effective barrier against fire. The tall laborer was deliberately neglecting to cut bushes that had sprung up within the original five-foot area.
The instant Charley noticed this, he spoke to the man. The others, scenting trouble, stopped work to look on. Charley sensed the situation and set himself for a tussle. "Let them know you're boss," he remembered Mr. Marlin had said to him. So he stepped toward the man and said quietly, "I neglected to say that I want this trail cleared to its original width. Just take out those bushes you have missed."
"The trail's wide enough," said the man, sulkily. "Lots of trails aren't half as wide as that."
"It isn't a question of how wide other trails are," said Charley good-naturedly, "or of how wide this ought to be. All I can do is to obey orders. Mr. Marlin told me to clear the trail just as it was originally."
The man looked angrily at Charley and sudden passion lighted up his eyes. "If Mr. Marlin wants this trail that wide, he can say so himself. But nobody's goin' to make me take orders from a high school boy. I know how this trail ought to be brushed."
Charley saw that it had come to a show-down. Inwardly he was greatly agitated. His heart beat so fast and the pulse in his temples throbbed so violently that he was afraid the men would see how excited he was. But he took a grip on himself and answered slowly, thinking hard all the time, and trying not to betray his real feelings. Again he recalled what his chief had said about letting the men know he was boss.
"You are quite right," said Charley slowly. "Nobody can make you take orders from a high school boy. This is a free country and you do not have to take orders from anybody if you don't want to. You are free to quit this job at any time you like and nobody can stop you. But as long as you stay on the job you will have to obey orders. I'll give you your time and you can get your pay at the office if you want to quit. If you want to stay, just brush out that trail as Mr. Marlin wants it brushed."
Without waiting for a reply Charley turned away and returned to his place at the head of the line. The men about him resumed their work with a will. In a moment the tall laborer picked up his axe and began clearing out the bushes he had missed. Charley had won.