"The bird's-eye?" inquired Appleton. "What do you mean?"
Fallon hesitated; his enthusiasm had carried him further than he had intended. He gazed out of the window, wondering how to proceed, when his eyes fastened upon a large, heavily bearded man who approached rapidly down the wooden sidewalk, a folded mackinaw swung carelessly across the fringed arm of his buckskin shirt.
The iron latch rattled; the man entered, closed the door behind him, and, turning, faced the two with a smile. For a long moment the men gazed at the newcomer in silence; then Fallon's chair crashed backward upon the floor as the Irishman leaped to his feet.
"Thim eyes!" he cried, throwing a huge arm across the man's shoulders and shaking him violently in his excitement. "Bill! Bill! Fer th' love av God, tell me 'tis yersilf! Ye damn' shcoundril, ain't ye dhrounded at all, at all? An' phwere ye ben kapin' yersilf?"
Bill laughed aloud and wrung Appleton's hand.
The lumberman had risen to his feet, staring incredulously into the other's face while he repeated over and over again: "My boy! My boy!"
Fallon danced about, waving his arms and shouting: "Th' new camp'll go t'rough hell a whoopin'! Bill'll be boss, an' th' min'll tear out th' bone to bate Moncrossen!"
Order was finally restored, and the three seated themselves while Bill recounted his adventures. Appleton's brow clouded as he learned the details of the bird's-eye plot.
"So that's the way he worked it?" he exclaimed. "I knew that there was some bird's-eye in the timber, and that I was not getting it. But I laid it to outside thieves—never supposed one of my own foremen was double-crossing me.
"That is Moncrossen's finish!" he added grimly. "I need him this winter. Too many contracts to afford to do without him. In the spring, though, there will be an accounting; and mark my words, he will get what is coming to him!"