“A brave man doesn’t court danger; he simply meets it bravely when it comes.”
“Well, I’ll try to meet it that way if it comes. At present Millbank looks like a fairly safe place. I don’t think I’ll get my throat cut here.”
“But you aren’t going to stay here,” the man urged. “You know you aren’t. You’re going——”
“We’ll dispense with information as to where I’m going,” Trafford interrupted. “It’s probably safe to state, but it’s possibly not. We’ll keep on the absolutely safe side as long as possible. Your train leaves in fifteen minutes.”
The gesticulating Canadian reappeared on the instant. Discipline asserted itself, and the man prepared to obey without further remonstrance.
CHAPTER VIII
A Man Disappears
TRAFFORD sent a hasty note to McManus, postponing the afternoon appointment, and made ready to visit the logging drives at work along the Kennebec. It was certain that no physician in Millbank had set a broken shoulder or arm within the twenty-four hours; no man of the character sought had left by any of the trains or stages, and the river afforded the only unguarded means of escape. A canoe or river-driver’s boat could easily come and go unnoticed, and it tallied with other points in hand that the assailants were connected with the logging interests. Another point in the case was that, in almost all the large gangs of drivers, there was sure to be some one roughly skilled in surgery, who could attend to minor accidents and even, temporarily, to those of a severer nature, such as are apt to occur, often at points far distant from skilled practitioners. Such a man could, under emergency, even possibly have set the arm or shoulder, and could certainly have cared for it until a surgeon at Norridgewock or farther up the river was reached. As yet the logging drives were all above Millbank Falls, so that Trafford’s search pointed entirely in that direction.
Every schoolboy or farmer’s lad is a walking directory to any logging drive within five miles, and Trafford had no difficulty in learning that the nearest drive was at the Bombazee Rips, above Norridgewock. Here he found the ordinary gang of a dozen men, with boats and the implements of their trade, at work on the logs which were beginning to jam against those that had first grounded on the ledge at the head of the rips. Full half of the gang were French Canadians, small, dark men of wonderful litheness and agility, men with a tenacity of life that seems to bid defiance to the wet and exposure of their trade. It was hard work by day, hard sleep by night, often in clothes soaked with the river water; yet cheerful, healthful good humour was evidenced in the loud chatter that came with every lull in the work. It was here that the grown lads of the Chaudière, Megantic, and St. François valleys secured that schooling in the English tongue from which race jealousy barred them at home.
A roughly constructed shanty of pine slabs, the earth bountifully spread with clean straw, served for sleeping; while in front was an immense fire of logs, which served double purpose, for warmth in the evening and cooking in the daytime. An old woodsman, whose driving days were past, acted as cook and general camp care-taker. A group of boys flittered about the fire, shanty, and boats. The older ones made ventures upon the logs, and sometimes lent a hand to a driver, handling a pick or cant-hook, a feat that made one a hero with his fellows for the remainder of the day.