Into that one he put three spikes, then he leapt lightly on another, a Douglas Fir, and spiked that too. He grew warm and threw off his jacket. It was a great pleasure to him to work, to feel that his strength had come back, to feel himself active, lithe, capable. And revenge was very sweet.
"Mebbe the saw cut off Quin's head," he murmured. He knew what he was doing and what would happen. He saw it quite clearly, for once in a saw-mill, when he was a kiddy, he had heard what happened when a saw cut on a hidden spike. The wedger-off had told the others how the great saw struck fire with a horrid grinding squeal. With the sawdust from the cut came fiery sparks, and then the saw, split in huge segments, hurtled from the cut. One piece went through the roof, another skimmed through the Mill like a piece of slate hurled by some mighty arm.
Pete knew what he was doing as he killed the logs. He spiked two dozen before he let up upon them.
"I fix heem," said Pete. "I fix heem lik' hell!"
He put on his jacket again and with the sledge in his hands went towards the dug-out. There were still many spikes in his pockets, for twice he had renewed his supply of them.
"I think I drive one more," said Pete, who was drunk with pleasure. "I tink one more for luck."
He set the spike in and started to drive it home. Now he was careless and suddenly he slipped. As he tried to recover himself, the sledge flew one way and he flew the other. He dropped between two logs: the one he had been standing on, and one on the boom of logs. That is, one of the boom logs saved his life, for the heavy spikes would have pulled him down if he had had to swim for a minute. As he let a yell out of him and felt a sudden fear of death his hands caught a chain between two of the outer boom logs. He pulled his head out of the water and hung on. The stream was bitter cold, for there was still ice in it. He gasped for breath, but presently got a leg across the chain. With a great effort he clawed the upper edge of the log and clambered back to safety.
"Oh," he grunted, as he lay flat and caught his breath, "that a very near ting, Pete."
It was a very near thing indeed.
But before dawn, as he paddled hard on the flood tide, he was back at Smith's and fast asleep.