A feeling of content was the only emotion that Toppy was conscious of in the long minutes during which he waited for Campbell to return. The drip-drip from the eaves and the chirp of the chickadees came as music to his ears. The Snow-Burner and he were going to fight; in that knowledge there was relief after the weeks of tension.
Heavy, crunching steps sounded on the snow outside, and Campbell’s broad shoulders filled the doorway. Toppy bent over and carefully tightened a shoe-lace.
“It’s all set,” said Campbell rapidly. “He says send you to him at once. You’re in luck. He’s in the stockade. Get you up and go to him. There is only one guard at the gate. I’ll follow and be handy in case he should interfere.”
That was all. Toppy rose up and strode out without a word. He made his way to the stockade gate with a carelessness of manner that belied his purpose. He noted that the guard stood on the outside of the gate and that the snow already was squashy underfoot. The gate opened and admitted him and closed behind him. Then he was walking across the yard toward Reivers, who stood waiting before the camp kitchen at the far end of the yard.
Here and there Toppy saw men in the bunkhouses, perhaps fifty in all, and realised that the sudden thaw had at once enforced a period of idleness for some of the men. He nodded lightly in response to the greeting from one of the men whom he had doctored; then he was standing before Reivers, and Reivers was looking at him as he had looked at Rosky the day when he broke the Bohunk’s leg. Toppy looked back, unmoved. For a moment the two stood silent, eye measuring eye. Then Reivers spoke savagely, enraged at finding a will that braved his own.
“What kind of a game are you trying to play, Treplin?”
“Game?” repeated Toppy innocently.
“Come, come!” Reivers’ brows were drawing down over his eyes, and again Toppy for some reason was reminded of a bear. “You don’t suppose I’m as innocent as Campbell, do you? You’ve been raising —— in the shop, I hear. You’re doing that with an object. You’re trying some game. I don’t care what it is; it doesn’t go. There doesn’t anybody try any games in this place except myself.”
“How about poker-games?” suggested Toppy quietly.
A man hidden in the darkness of the bunkhouse behind Reivers snickered audibly; for Campbell had told the story of how Toppy had bested the boss at poker and the man understood Toppy’s thrust. Reivers’ eyes flashed and his jaw shot out, but in an instant he had his anger under control again. He smiled.