The Riverman | Page 9

to cut her out. I've made him every reasonable proposition, but all I get
back is quotations from the prophets. Now, we've got to get those logs
out--that's what we're here for. A fine bunch of whitewater birlers we'd
look if we got hung up by an old mossback in a plug hat. Johnny Sims,
what's the answer?"
"Cut her out," grinned Johnny Sims briefly.
"Correct!" replied Orde with a chuckle. "Cut her out. But, my son, it's
against the law to interfere with another man's property."
This was so obviously humourous in intent that its only reception
consisted of more grins from everybody.
"But," went on Orde more seriously, "it's quite a job. We can't work
more than six or eight men at it at a time. We got to work as fast as we

can before the old man can interfere."
"The nearest sheriff's at Spruce Rapids," commented some one
philosophically.
"We have sixty men, all told," said Orde. "We ought to be able to carry
it through."
He filled his plate and walked across to a vacant place. Here he found
himself next to Newmark.
"Hello!" he greeted that young man, "fixed it with the doctor all right?"
"Yes," replied Newmark, in his brief, dry manner, "thanks! I think I
ought to tell you that the sheriff is not at Spruce Rapids, but at the
village--expecting trouble."
Orde whistled, then broke into a roar of delight.
"Boys," he called, "old Plug Hat's got the sheriff right handy. I guess he
sort of expected we'd be thinking of cutting through that dam. How'd
you like to go to jail?"
"I'd like to see any sheriff take us to jail, unless he had an army with
him," growled one of the river-jacks.
"Has he a posse?" inquired Orde of Newmark.
"I didn't see any; but I understood in the village that the governor had
been advised to hold State troops in readiness for trouble."
Orde fell into a brown study, eating mechanically. The men began an
eager and somewhat truculent discussion full of lawless and
bloodthirsty suggestion. Some suggested the kidnapping and
sequestration of Reed until the affair should be finished.
"How'd he get hold of his old sheriff, then?" they inquired with some
pertinence.

Orde, however, paid no attention to all this talk, but continued to frown
into space. At last his face cleared, and he slapped down his tin plate so
violently that the knife and fork jumped off into the dirt.
"I have it!" he cried aloud.
But he would not tell what he had. After the noon hour he instructed a
half-dozen men to provide themselves with saws, axes, picks, and
shovels, and all marched in the direction of the mill.
When within a hundred yards or so of that structure the advancing
riverman saw the lank, black figure of the mill owner flap into sight,
astride a bony old horse, and clatter away, coat-tails flying, up the road
and into the waiting forest.
"Now, boys!" cried Orde crisply. "He'll be back in an hour with the
sheriff. Lively!" He rapidly designated ten men of his crew. "You boys
get to work and make things hum. Get as much done as you can before
the sheriff comes."
"He'll have to bring all of Spruce County to get me," commented one of
those chosen, spitting on his hands.
"Me, too!" said others.
"Now, listen," said Orde, holding them with an impressive gesture.
"When that sheriff comes, with or without a posse, I want you to go
peaceably. Understand?"
"Cave in? Not much!" cried Purdy.
"See here," and Orde drew them aside to an earnest, low-voiced
conversation that lasted several minutes. When he had finished he
clapped each of them on the back, and all moved off, laughing, to the
dam.
"Now, boys," he commanded the others, "no row without orders.
Understand? If there's going to be a fight, I'll give you the word when."

The chopping crew descended to the bottom of the sluice, the gate of
which had been shut, and began immediately to chop away at the apron.
As the water in the pond above had been drawn low by the morning's
work, none overflowed the gate, so the men were enabled to work dry.
Below the apron, of course, had been filled in with earth and stones. As
soon as the axe-men had effected an entry to this deposit, other men
with shovels and picks began to remove the filling.
The work had continued nearly an hour when Orde commanded the
fifty or more idlers back to camp.
"Get out, boys," he ordered. "The sheriff will be here pretty quick now,
and I don't want any row. Get out of sight."
"And leave them to fight her out alone? Guess not!" grumbled a tall,
burly individual