CHAPTER XIII
A MOMENTOUS STEP
The camp, which consisted of a sawmill, an immense bunk-house capable of accommodating more than a hundred men, and a number of scattered outbuildings, was picturesquely located in a depression between two great hills. A mountain stream that came tearing down the side of one of the hills furnished power for the mill. Later on, some of its waters would be diverted to the giant flumes, down which the logs would come hurtling to the valley below.
Just now it was by no means the scene of busy life that it would become in the late fall and throughout the winter. Then would come the bearded lumberjacks, hardy, red-faced giants of the woods, Swedes, Norwegians, Irishmen, Frenchmen, hard workers, hard fighters, hard drinkers, and the wood would ring with the clang of axes and the crash of falling trees.
At present there was little work going on. The sawmill, with a small force of men, was running in a languid sort of way, clearing up some of the by-products of the season before. The camp might be said to be in a state of suspended animation.
A sort of deputy foreman who was in charge gave the party a cordial greeting and showed them about the various points of interest, explaining volubly the processes through which the lumber passed from the standing tree to the shaped and finished product of the mills.
“We’ve got only a small force working in the woods just now,” he explained. “They’re nicking the trees, so that the men will know which ones are to be cut down this coming fall and winter.”
“Sort of passing sentence of death, as it were,” said Jack.
“I suppose you might call it that,” smiled the foreman.
“It seems a pity that they should have to die,” said Cora, as her eyes took in the stately trees that decked the mountain side.
“Especially after what Mr. Morley was saying yesterday about the trees being alive,” remarked Bess.