"Oi'll bet me winther's wages, come shpr-ring, we'll have Moncrossen shnowed undher dayper thin' yon smithy, an' they had to tunnel to foind ut."
The girl laughed happily and passed on with a great love in her heart for Daddy Dunnigan and the big, rough men out in the timber who were "tearing out the bone" that her man might make good.
Day by day the black pyramids of the rollways lengthened, and the skidways were pushed farther and farther into the timber. And, of all the men in the crew, none worked harder nor to better purpose than Stromberg, the big hulking Swede, whom Fallon had warned Bill was the brains of Moncrossen's bird's-eye gang.
Neither Bill nor the big swamper had ever alluded to that affair in the bunk-house upon the night of their first meeting, and it was with a feeling of surprise that the foreman looked up one evening as he sat alone in the little office to see Stromberg enter and cross to his side.
The man lost no time in coming to the point.
"Bill," he began, "I went up with Buck Moncrossen this summer to bring down the bird's-eye. We found a pile of ashes where the logs should have been. Moncrossen thinks Creed burned them—or let someone do it.
"It was a crooked game, and I was in it as deep as any one. I ain't trying to beg off—but, I'd rather be square than crooked—and that's the truth. I ain't spent most of my life in the woods not to be able to tell hardwood ashes from soft-wood, and I know you slipped one over on us.
"You're going to make good in the woods. You'll be the big boss, some day. I expect to do time for my part in the bird's-eye game, and I'll take all that's coming to me. And I won't snitch on the rest to get a lighter sentence, either.
"I know Appleton, and I know we'll get ours in the spring, but what I want to know is: when I get out, can I come to you for a job?"
Bill rose from his chair and thrust a big hand toward the other.