After a time he reached a gap in the trees. The railroad pierced the wood, and on one side the birches and poplars were chopped back. The trunks lay beside a forking row of rails and Kit smelt sappy wood and withering leaves. Following the branch track, he stopped at a river. Log shacks, tents, and two or three iron shanties occupied the high clay bank, and a wooden bridge carried the line across. A hundred yards off, clusters of iron columns, strongly braced, broke the muddy current. Steel girders and a network of tie-rods and wooden platforms joined the columns to the bank.
Work had stopped and brown-skinned men swarmed about the tin basins on the benches in front of the bunk-house. The men’s shirts and brown overalls were stained by grease and clay. Kit thought them an athletic lot, and he stopped one.
“Is your boss about?” he inquired.
“He’s not,” said the other and started for the washing bench.
Kit got in front of the fellow. “When will the boss arrive? I’m looking for a job.”
“I sure don’t know. You might see the foreman. He’s by the shack.”
Kit steered for the spot, and the foreman looked at him thoughtfully.
“Are you a blacksmith?”
“I am not, but I can use a forge hammer and sharpen tools.”
“We want a blacksmith,” remarked the foreman, and began to move away.