He was standing in front of the hotel, breathing in the pure morning air, and wondering if Merriwell and his friends would turn out in time to go with him or would wait for the drive to reach Matawamkeag, when he was astonished to see Mike Sullivan, his foreman, come out of the door.
Sullivan was no less astonished to see Forest, and he would have dodged back into the hotel, but he realized that he had been seen and it was useless to dodge.
“What in the world does this mean, Sullivan?” demanded Forest, sharply.
The foreman muttered something, quickly pulling out a colored handkerchief and trying to conceal the battered and bruised condition of his face under pretense of wiping his mouth.
“Why are you here?” asked the young lumberman.
“I thought you might be in town, and I came down ahead of the drive ter see ye,” said the foreman, thickly.
“But what’s the matter with your face? You have been fighting.”
“Man has ter fight sometimes.”
“But I know your propensity. You had rather fight than eat. You have been drinking, too. You had no business to leave the drive and come down here. Your place is with the men.”
Sullivan was silent.