The Timber Pirate

by Charles Christopher Jenkins

I

When Louis Hammond went away from the City Club after his conference with Norman T. Gildersleeve he was convinced of two things. The one was that Gildersleeve had not told him the entire truth. There had been a furtiveness about the demeanour of Gildersleeve that irritated Hammond: furthermore, there had been the acknowledged duplicity of Winch in passing himself off as a United States consul, not to mention Gildersleeve’s veiled insinuations as to Josephine Stone’s connection with the North Star. To Hammond’s way of thinking, these and other elements of Gildersleeve’s methods did not “hang” very well. The other conviction was that the North Star people had been cognizant of Gildersleeve’s plans from the very first. There was now no doubt, in view of what had happened, that Acey Smith, the pulp camp superintendent, suspected, or perhaps knew definitely, from the night he landed that he, Hammond, was identified with Gildersleeve and had been sent out to the limits for the purpose of aiding in balking the North Star’s plans. That being so, either Acey Smith had his own hidden objects in view in allowing Hammond the freedom of the camp, or else—well, Hammond rather scouted the idea that the Argus-eyed master of the Nannabijou Limits considered him a nonentity in this conflict of wits who wasn’t worth troubling his head about. It couldn’t be that, he surmised, because Smith was not the type to overlook any possibilities of interference with his plans. The deeper motive that he might have had in view eluded Hammond’s shrewdest deductions. Out in the woods Acey Smith was playing at his own game, and more experienced men than Hammond had failed to fathom him. Even those most closely associated with him admitted they never intimately understood this most inaccessible man of moods.

Anyway, Hammond felt immensely relieved to be free of all responsibility to either of the contending companies, and, having cashed Norman T. Gildersleeve’s cheque in payment for his services next day, he began planning a certain little affair of his own.

He was unable to get passage out to the limits until noon, and the trip was made on a cranky, wheezing little gasolene tug manned by inexperienced seamen.

The tugmen’s strike was on. Not only had all the North Star seamen left their boats, but they had taken out with them the crews of all the other towing and salvaging companies between the Soo and the Head of the Lakes. It was rumoured that the strike would next extend to the grain carriers and the passenger and freight boats plying up and down the Great Lakes.

The lumberjacks’ unions, however, had not yet called their sympathetic strike. At the Nannabijou Limits Hammond found things much the same as when he had left, except that there seemed to be a large number of strange men prowling around the camp, who, though they wore bush garb, were patently not North Star men. At regular intervals, along the waterfront and the roads leading up into the woods, armed members of the Canadian Mounted Police were stationed, obviously for the protection of property in case violence followed.

The lumberjacks were plainly in a sullen mood, especially the foreigners, on whom the presence of the uniformed representatives of Canadian law and order produced an ugly irritation. But, under the iron rule of Acey Smith, weapons of any sort beyond the axes which the men used in their work were strictly forbidden, so that an armed outbreak was out of the question.

Hammond himself, on landing and producing his pass of identification, was requested to step over to a little group of police, where his pockets were lightly tapped to detect the possible presence of concealed weapons. “Sorry to put you to this bother, sir,” smiled the officer in charge. “Just a matter of form, you know. Connected with the North Star Company, I suppose?”

“No,” replied the young man. “I am here on private business of my own, but I expect to be in camp for a short time.”

The officer gave him a sharp look as though committing his face to memory. He seemed about to ask another question, but instead nodded politely to signify the interview was over.