"To tell the truth, I didn't suppose it was. Anyway, these trees aren't spruce. They're red cedar; the stuff they make roofing shingles of."
"Precisely. Just now, shingles are in good demand in the Province, and with the wooden towns springing up on the prairie, western millers can hardly send roofing material across the Rockies fast enough. Besides this, I haven't struck a creek more adapted for running down logs, and the last sharp drop to tide-water would give power for a mill. I'm only puzzled that none of the timber-lease prospectors have recorded the place."
"That's easy to understand," laughed Carroll. "Like you, they'd no doubt first search the most difficult spots to get at."
They went on, and when darkness fell they pitched their light tent beside the creek. It was now freezing hard, and after supper the men lay smoking, wrapped in blankets, with the tent between them and the stinging wind, while a great fire of cedar branches snapped and roared in front of them. Sometimes the red blaze shot up, flinging a lurid light on the stately trunks and tinging the men's faces with the hue of burnished copper; sometimes it fanned out away from them while the sparks drove along the frozen ground and the great forest aisle, growing dim, was filled with drifting vapor. The latter was aromatic; pungently fragrant.
"It struck me that you were disappointed when you got no mail at Comox," Carroll remarked at length, feeling that he was making something of a venture.
"I was," admitted Vane.
"That's strange," Carroll persisted, "because your hearing nothing from Nairn left you free to go ahead, which, one would suppose, was what you wanted."
Vane happened to be in a confidential mood; though usually averse to sharing his troubles, he felt that he needed sympathy.
"I'd better confess that I wrote Miss Chisholm a few lines from Nanaimo."
"And she didn't answer you? Now, I couldn't well help noticing that you were rather in her bad graces that night at Nairn's—the thing was pretty obvious. No doubt you're acquainted with the reason?"