“Sometimes you’re horribly obstinate, but if you’re not satisfied, you must talk to the boys. They saw you about and they’ll admit they took your orders. If you study the job, I expect you’ll see the orders were good.”
Austin’s look was thoughtful, but Kit imagined he was to some extent convinced, and soon afterwards the cook carried in their breakfast.
After a few days Wheeler arrived and approved all the others had done. When he had examined their work he called Kit to his office.
“You’ll be glad to hear we have arranged for Austin to take control?”
“I think you have got the proper man, but when we talked about it you did not agree.”
Wheeler shrugged. “My word goes, but I’m not head boss. At all events, you didn’t put across your bluff and have got to quit! Now the frost’s begun, we’ll break the gangs and you can pull out for the workshops.”
“So long as you have given me another post I mustn’t grumble,” Kit remarked with a smile. “In fact, on the whole, I think my luck is pretty good. To bluff a big construction company is rash.”
Wheeler gave him a queer look. “Well, I don’t know if you’d hesitate about bluffing a construction gang! All the same, if you stay with it at the shops, I’ll send for you when we start up in spring. Now you had better pack your trunk. A train goes down the line in the afternoon.”
Kit packed his trunk, and at dusk a locomotive and a row of flat cars rolled across the old wooden bridge. The cook and a foreman put Kit’s trunk in the calaboose, and for a few minutes he talked to Austin and looked about.
The snowy woods shone in the sunset and the broad white plain melted in ethereal blue; by contrast, the open channel of the river was black like ink. Two or three faint plumes of smoke went straight up, and along the bridge a few hammers beat. That was all and Kit felt the camp was strangely quiet. Winter had arrived. Then somebody signalled and Austin gave Kit his hand.