heavy blow that reached the dam watcher's
face, and followed it immediately by another. Then Shearer caught his
arm, motioning the dazed and bloody victim of the attack to get out
of sight. Thorpe shook his foreman off with one impatient motion,
and strode away up the river, his head erect, his eyes flashing, his
nostrils distended.

"I reckon you'd better mosey," Shearer dryly advised the dam watcher;
and followed.

Late in the afternoon the two men reached Dam Three, or rather the spot
on which Dam Three had stood. The same spectacle repeated itself here,
except that Ellis, the dam watcher, was nowhere to be seen.

"The dirty whelps," cried Thorpe, "they did a good job!"

He thrashed about here and there, and so came across Ellis blindfolded
and tied. When released, the dam watcher was unable to give any account
of his assailants.

"They came up behind me while I was cooking," he said. "One of 'em
grabbed me and the other one kivered my eyes. Then I hears the 'shot'
and knows there's trouble."

Thorpe listened in silence. Shearer asked a few questions. After the
low-voiced conversation Thorpe arose abruptly.

"Where you going?" asked Shearer.

But the young man did not reply. He swung, with the same long, nervous
stride, into the down-river trail.

Until late that night the three men--for Ellis insisted on accompanying
them--hurried through the forest. Thorpe walked tirelessly, upheld by
his violent but repressed excitement. When his hat fell from his head,
he either did not notice the fact, or did not care to trouble himself
for its recovery, so he glanced through the trees bare-headed, his broad
white brow gleaming in the moonlight. Shearer noted the fire in his
eyes, and from the coolness of his greater age, counselled moderation.

"I wouldn't stir the boys up," he panted, for the pace was very swift.
"They'll kill some one over there, it'll be murder on both sides."

He received no answer. About midnight they came to the camp.

Two great fires leaped among the trees, and the men, past the idea of
sleep, grouped between them, talking. The lesson of twisted timbers
was not lost to their experience, and the evening had brought its
accumulation of slow anger against the perpetrators of the outrage.
These men were not given to oratorical mouthings, but their low-voiced
exchanges between the puffings of a pipe led to a steadier purpose than
that of hysteria. Even as the woodsmen joined their group, they ha