When the bottoms drop out of the logging-roads, the crews leave the camps about the headwaters of Racket River and return to their scattered homes, leaving the winter's cut on the "brows." A few weeks later, when all the melted snow of the hills is rushing along the watercourses, lifting and bursting the rotted ice, and the piles of brown logs on the steep banks go rolling and thundering down into roaring waters, the more active and daring of the workers return to duty with the harassed timber. Now they wear well-greased boots instead of oily shoepacks and larrigans—boots with high tops strapped securely around the leg, and strong heels and thick soles. In the sole and heel of each boot are fixed fifty caulks or short steel spikes—a hundred teeth for every "stream-driver" to bite a foothold with into running logs.

The task of keeping the "drive" moving down the swirling and tortuous channel of the upper reaches of Racket River calls for skill and agility and strength and hardihood, and frequently for a high degree of stark physical courage. The water is as cold as the sodden ice which still drifts upon it, crushed and churned by the grinding logs. It sloshes high along the wooded banks, tearing tangles of alders out by the roots and undermining old cedars until they totter and fall and swirl away on the flood. To plunge hip-deep into that torrent to clear some log caught broadside to the rush by snag or tree or rock, calls for hardihood of spirit and an iron constitution. Where one log catches and is permitted to remain stationary, others catch, pile up, plunge and rear and dive, filling the channel to its rocky bed and blocking it from bank to bank with criss-crossed timber. The mad river, crowned with more logs and ice, strikes and recoils and backs up behind the jamb: spray flies over it; clear water spouts from it; the twisted timbers heave and groan and splinter. To go out on to such a barrier as this, and find and free the key-logs with a peavy, calls for all the qualities of a seasoned riverman and the courage of a veteran soldier into the bargain.

On Racket River, Mark Ducat, of Piper's Glen, was the most daring and successful negotiator of troublesome logs jambed or jambing or running free. He was cock of the upper river, as his father, Peter, had been before him, and his grandfather, Hercules Ducat, had been before Peter. For five years, on five successive drives, he had shown his superiority to his fellow wielders of peavy and pikepole as a "cuffer" of running logs and a breaker of jambs. And not only that. He was as nimble with his feet and hands, and as fearless in diversion as in toil. There were stronger men than Mark on the river, but there was no man possessed of Mark's combination of strength and speed and nerve. The stronger fellows were too heavy to be speedy. He stood five feet and eleven inches in his spiked boots and weighed one hundred and seventy-eight pounds.

New men joined the drive each spring for the brief and well-paid job, and likely lads arrived at their full growth and an appreciation of their own powers; and so it happened that Mark Ducat's title never went a year unchallenged. But still he was Cock of the River.

After the first rush of the drive one spring, the boss left Mark and a gang of nine "white-water boys" to keep the logs clear at Frenchman's Elbow, the worst point for jambs in ten miles of bad water. Mark was foreman and Joe Bender was cook. All the others were Racket River men, with the exception of a big stranger with a black beard who said that he was from Quebec.

Charlie Lavois was the stranger's name. Underdone beef was his favorite diet and overproof whisky was his favorite drink. He had chopped throughout the previous winter in a big camp on the Gateneau and, to avoid making himself conspicuous, to keep his daily cut down to normal, he had swung his ax only with one hand; and because six men had once attacked him with knives and sticks of stove-wood after a game of forty-fives in which his skill had emptied all their pockets, and he had killed two of them and disabled the others in self defence, he had thought it advisable to leave his native Province for a little while—all this by his own telling.

"Ye may be that good in Quebec, Charlie Lavois, but any six yearlin' babies on the Racket River country in this here old Province of New Brunswick could knock the stuffin' out o' ye with nothin' in their hands but their rattles an' little rubber suckin'-nipples," said Joe Bender, the cook.

This sally of rustic wit was well received by the lads of Racket River, but Mr. Lavois took exception to it.

"Maybe ye could do it yerself," retorted Lavois.

"Maybe I could, but it ain't my job," returned Bender. "My job's keepin' the blankets dry an' the beans an' biscuits hot for champeens like yerself. I ain't Cock o' the River."

"Cock of the river?" queried Lavois, spitting into the fire. "Where I come from, this here dribble o' dirty water'd be named a brook an' the cock o' it would be called a cockerel."

"That's me," said Mark Ducat. "Fetch a lantern an' a deck of cards, Joe. Kick up the fire, Jerry Brown. We'll spread a blanket an' commence with a little game of forty-fives, Mister; an' ye'll find this cockerel right with ye all the way from flippin' a card to manslaughter."

They played for three hours, at the end of which period of stress the man from Quebec threw the cards into the fire and sent a volley of blasting oaths after them. He was a poor loser.

By morning the logs were running thin, for the weight of the drive had passed, and so it was an easy matter to keep the crooked channel clear at Frenchman's Elbow.

Charlie Lavois leapt onto a big stick of spruce, with a pikepole held horizontally across his chest, and turned it slowly over and over under his spiked feet as it wallowed heavily along with the brown current. Mark Ducat took a short run and a flying jump and landed on the other end of the same log, facing Lavois. He also carried a pikepole horizontally in his two hands. The log sank lower; and now it turned with increasing speed to the tread of four spiked feet biting into its tough bark; and still it continued on its way through sloshing ripple and spinning eddy. The rest of the gang followed down both shores, shouting in derision and encouragement. Even Joe Bender deserted his post to see the Cock of the River and the champion from Quebec twirl a log together.

"Grand day," said Mark, grinning.

"Not so bad," agreed Charlie Lavois.

"Two's one too many for this log," said Mark. "I'm gettin' my feet wet."

"Yer dead right. But ye'll be wet clear over yer ears in ten seconds," retorted the other.

Then Mark began to jump with both feet, slowing the spinning of the big log jerk by jerk and finally reversing the spin. Again he trod the log, but now from left to right; and Lavois was forced to conform his movements to the reversed motion. The men ashore yelled their approval. Their man had "jerked the spin" away from the big Quebecker. Then Lavois commenced jumping in a furious effort to check and reverse against Mark. Mark trod against him with what appeared to be all his strength and skill for thirty seconds or more; and then, without so much as the flicker of an eye to signal his intention, he jumped swiftly around and reversed the stamp and thrust of his flying feet. The tortured log spun with sudden incredible speed—a speed entirely unexpected by Charles Lavois. Charlie's feet, stamping mightily against stubborn resistance, and suddenly relieved of their resistance, went around with the log; and Charlie followed his feet. The log reared high, but Ducat skipped along its lifting back and brought it to a level keel. A yell of joy went up from the husky fellows ashore. The man who had gained his title by sousing them in the river had maintained it by sousing the man from Quebec.

Lavois swam ashore and hastened upstream to the fire without a word. There he pulled off his boots and coat, took a swig from a flask on his hip and sat so close to the bank of red embers that steam arose from him. Mark Ducat rode the big log ashore, using the pike-pole for a paddle. He, too, made his way to Joe Bender's fire, accompanied by such members of the gang as were on that side of the river. He, too, removed his coat and boots and sat close to the glow.

"Is there anything ye can do, Lavois, 'cept shoot off yer mouth about what ye done on the Gateneau?" asked Mark.

"Did ye hear me speak o' playin' monkey-tricks on logs?" returned Lavois. "No, ye didn't. Ye heard me tell how I knocked the everlastin' lights out o' six full-growed men, an' Quebec men, at that—real white-water boys."

"Do tell? What d'ye fight with when ye get real riled?"

"Everything God give me an' most anything I kin lay me hands on."

"That suits me fine."

Both reached for their spiked boots.

"Boots is barred," said Joe Bender, who held a long-handled iron stew-pan in his hairy right fist. "Ye fight in yer socks, boys. Axes, grindstones, peavy, rocks an' clubs an' knives is all barred along with boots; an' the first one to reach for any sich article gits soaked good an' plenty with this here stew-pan. I ain't Champeen Buster o' the Gateneau nor Cock o' Racket River, but I be a ring-tailed roarin' Hell-an'-all with a stew-pan."

"That suits me, Joe," said Mark Ducat.

"I guess I kin do the job with me hands an' feet," said Lavois.

Both men stood up. They faced each other, six feet apart. Lavois was older than Ducat by eight or ten years and heavier by close upon twenty pounds. But as Ducat was only twenty-six, both were young men. Ducat had a merry eye; he smiled, and his little black mustache went up at the tips. Lavois had sullen eyes and a wolfish grin.

Lavois jumped and kicked, quick as winking. Mark got his chin out of the way of destruction, but lost the skin of his right ear. Lavois gripped with both arms. They writhed and staggered. Mark had the worst of that hold, but he knew what he was about. He knew all the old tricks of this dangerous game and possessed a lively imagination for new ones. He clung close and tight and let Lavois do the heavy work. Twice he was crushed to his knees, and twice he came up again, each time as if for the last time. And then, with a quick wrench and a mighty effort, he backed Lavois into the fire.

Lavois wore four pairs of heavy socks, and unfortunately all were of wool. No pair was of asbestos. He yelled and loosed his hold and tried to jump aside, only to receive a bang on the nose. He snatched up his blistered feet and landed on his back across the red crown of the fire. Mark jumped the fire, pulled Lavois out, dragged him to the river by his black beard and chucked him in. He sizzled and steamed as he struck the water.

Lavois finished out the drive with his feet in bandages. He didn't do another stroke of work; and whenever the gang moved, following the tail of the drive down the crooked river, he went comfortably in the boat along with the cook and the tin ovens and the gang's dunnage. He was well treated and well fed; and when Ducat's gang overhauled the boss at the mouth of the river, Mark gave Lavois his full time and no one questioned it. Lavois grinned.

"I wish ye'd hove me into the fire afore ye did," he said.

CHAPTER II
YOUNG TODHUNTER

Some hundred miles south of Piper's Glen, and across an international boundary into the bargain, young James Todhunter had just heard the news that college was out of the question; that his father's health had broken down, and that it was most decidedly up to him to do something in the way of earning a living.

"I can give you a small stake, Jim," his father said, "but it won't be very much. It is going to take a lot to take mother and me West and I'll be out of things a long while, I am afraid. How about it?"

James Todhunter came of a family of sportsmen—his father and his favorite uncle had been big game hunters in their day—and he received the news as a sportsman would; and, to his credit, with never a thought of all that his prep. school prowess at athletics had been going to mean to him at college.

"Fine," he said. "I'll manage," with all the conviction in the world and a total lack of ideas.

It was not till that night that the big idea came. He'd always wanted to go North to the logging country—North to the region where his uncle had so often hunted and fished and felt the lure of the big timber. Why not go North and get a job? His parents would be away, he'd have a little money, and all the thoughtfully chosen kit he had inherited from his uncle the year before. The poor man had died possessed of little else but guns of the best makes, equipment of every known manufacture and sort for life in the wilds of every continent. It had been his passion, and he had spared no expense in making his outfit perfect from a sportsman's point of view. Much of the assortment had never been used, but there it was, perfect in every detail.

"I'd better take everything he had of his northern camping stuff," said young Todhunter to himself. "You never know your luck."

His own luck seemed pretty fair, for the first man he interviewed—an old friend of both his father and his uncle—knew the timber country well; had camped and surveyed all over it, and was acquainted with numerous guides, trappers, prospectors, and lumbermen. He, in turn, had a friend who thought young Todhunter might do worse than go to Millbrook.

Millbrook was in the heart of the wilderness, thought of which appealed most to young Jim Todhunter, and there also seemed to be a business opportunity there. A Mr. Hammond carried on a business in timber and supplies at this pioneer outpost, where, according to his uncle's friend, there were moose, caribou, deer, and bear right at the door. No doubt Hammond would welcome as assistant a young American with a little capital, which might eventually be invested in the business, although, of course, salary would be meager to start with.

A rapid interchange of letters took place, and it ended in Hammond's writing to say he'd find a place for a young chap with some capital of his own—Jim's modest hundreds would go quite a way in the timber country. James's uncle's friend didn't know much of Hammond himself, but "splendid fellows, all of them, in those virgin lands: big hearted, big souled," he assured young Todhunter genially, and betook himself to his own affairs.

Thus it was that one September day young James Todhunter found himself being lurched along in the single passenger car of a single track railway, eventually to reach Covered Bridge, the end of iron of that particular system of transportation.

His baggage consisted of the pick of his late uncle's assortment and certainly impressed the station-master at Covered Bridge. Here was a picnic-basket, as large as a cabin-trunk and as full of ingenious complications as a lady's dressing-bag. Here was a collapsible bath and an Arctic sleeping-bag. Rifle and gun each reposed in a large case of hard, yellow leather. Here were boots for every phase of life in the North as imagined and experienced by his uncle, a trunkful of them. Here were fishing-rods in canvas cases—a rod for each of every size and variety of finny gamester, from the tarpoon to the sardine. The other necessities of life—clothing, sheath-knives, cases of razors, field-glasses, a photographic outfit, revolvers, a spirit-lamp, and so on—were contained in three large trunks and two smaller cases, also of leather.

The station-master, who was also the telegraph operator, was a busy young man. He had very little time to devote to Jim even after the engine had been reversed on a turntable and had gone away, pushing cars of sawn lumber and cord-wood before it. He walked around the pyramid of Jim's baggage on the open platform seven times, only to retire each time, without a word, to the little red shack that was evidently his office.

Jim sat on one of his boxes and waited for Mr. Hammond. He smoked cigarettes and surveyed the scene. The September sun shone bright upon the wooded hills, the rapid brown river, the narrow fields and the gray bridge. The foliage of maples and birches among the dark green and purple of the forests was showing patches and dashes of red and yellow. There was a pleasant tang in the air suggestive of wood-smoke and sun-steeped balsam and running water and frost-nipped ferns.

The station-master came out of his shack for the eighth time. Again he walked around the formidable pile of baggage. Then he paused and looked Jim in the eye.

"Waitin' for someone?" he asked.

"Yes, for Mr. Hammond of Millbrook," answered Jim.

"Amos Hammond?"

"Yes."

"My name's Harvey White."

"Mine is James Todhunter."

"Ye're an American?"

"You bet."

"Had yer dinner?"

Jim hadn't, and he said so: and White invited him into the red shack, where there was a stove with a fire in it. The kettle was singing. White made tea, set the table, brought a crock of baked beans from the oven and an apple pie from the pantry and pushed a chair against the back of Jim's legs.

"We can keep a look-out for Hammond through the window," he said.

Jim was hungry and the food vanished swiftly.

"Goin' into the woods from Millbrook?" asked White.

"Yes, I expect to, of course," replied Jim.

"Who's yer guide? The Ducats up to Piper's Glen are slick men in the woods, but it ain't always that any of 'em will take a sport into their country."

Young Todhunter started to explain, then stopped.

"Well, ye're after moose, I guess, ain't you?" added White.

"I hope to go after moose, of course, and whatever other game you have here—but my chief reason for coming is to work for Mr. Hammond," answered Jim.

The section of pie which White was raising to his mouth fell from the blade of his knife. He stared for a moment, then lowered his glance and his knife and resumed his interrupted consumption of pie.

"Why not?" asked Jim, who had two perfectly good eyes in his head.

"D'ye know him?" returned the other.

"I've never met him."

"Are you in business with him?"

"Not exactly. Not yet, I mean to say: I'm to learn the business and then I might invest something in it."

"Good wages?"

"Oh, nothing to speak of. I'm new to business and the country, I can't expect much to start. I shall work with Mr. Hammond and get a practical knowledge of the business and the conditions under which it is carried on."

"Hell!"

"Say, what's wrong with Hammond?"

"You'll soon find out more'n I know, I guess. Work's worth wages in this country. You don't look so darned green, neither. Do you play cards?";

"Cards? Yes, I know a few games. But about Hammond? What sort of person is he?"

"What sort would he be, to bring a lad like you up here to work for him for almost nothing? But it ain't no affair of mine! D'ye know black-jack?"

"Well, I've heard of it."

"All right."

White piled the dishes on a corner of the table and dealt from a pack of cards very much the worse for wear. Jim produced his cigarette case, opened it and extended it.

Both young men were intent on the game when it was disturbed by the opening of the door. The air was blue with smoke, and Harvey White was the first to look up from his hand. Then Jim turned and saw the intruder standing silent on the threshold. Jim glanced back at his host and was puzzled by the mixed expressions of chagrin and amusement and defiance on the other's face.

"I'm lookin' for James Todhunter," said the stranger.

"That's my name," said Jim, standing up. "Have you been sent for me by Mr. Hammond of Millbrook?"

"Sent for ye? I'm Amos Hammond," returned the man at the door.

"Oh! I beg your pardon!" exclaimed Jim, and Harvey White sniggered.

"We'll move right along," said Hammond abruptly. "We're late now."

A little core of heat began to glow in Jim's heart.

"Very well, but if we're late it's your fault," he said.

The tanned skin above Hammond's dark beared grayed for an instant, then reddened, and the close eyes narrowed, and the lips twisted. If ever a man looked like swearing and didn't, it was Amos Hammond at that moment. He turned in silence and stepped out into the sunshine.

Young Todhunter shook hands cordially with White, thanked him for the dinner and the entertainment, and followed the man from Millbrook to where a heavy wagon and a team of big grays stood beside the platform.

"Which is your belongin's?" asked Hammond harshly, pausing beside the imposing mound of baggage.

"All this stuff is mine," replied Jim casually.

"All yours?" cried Hammond, with a change of voice and eyes. "If they're filled with anything more valuable nor bricks, then they must be worth a power of money. You are blessed with a considerable share of this world's goods, James Todhunter—but a humble and a contrite heart is worth more than gold."

Jim felt embarrassed.

"I'm not rich, as you must know already, Mr. Hammond," he replied. "These trunks and things contain nothing but my personal belongings—clothing and that sort of things."

"Well, that's somethin'," returned Hammond. "When I was yer age, James, a quart measure would of held all of my personal clothin' I didn't happen to be wearin' at the time. You'd of done better to of kep' yer money till you got here an' let me lay it out for you in trade—but property is property."

The high wagon was soon loaded. The load was secured with heavy ropes. Hammond and Jim took their places side by side on the board which served as a seat, and the big grays settled into their padded collars, straightened out the steel traces with a jangle and pulled away from the platform. Jim looked back over his shoulder and saw the station-master watching through the window of the red shack.

The road dipped to the covered bridge. The bridge was a long tunnel of soft gloom and golden, dusty twilight. The hoofs boomed on the plank flooring; the roof showed a few pinpoints of sunshine and long shafts of light slanted through cracks between the weather-warped boards of the walls. Amos Hammond looked as agreeable as his peculiar cast of countenance permitted. The road went up steeply a distance of fifty yards or so, reached a level and swung along it to the right, and ran northward between the brown river and the wooded hillside.

"I spoke short when I first met you, James," said Hammond, giving young Todhunter a swift glance and a crooked smile. "I was right glad to see you an' welcome you to Racket River—but I ain't no dissembler. A plain, downright man, rough, but honest: that's me an' that's how ye'll always find me, my friend. My anger flared when I seen yer company an' yer occupation, James, but I ain't one to condemn a young feller on sight. Many a good man has been tempted. Aye, an' many a godly man has played about the brink of the Pit of Everlastin' Damnation in the days of his unregenerate youth."

This was language new to young Todhunter. His first thought was that it was a joke in a style of humor peculiar to Racket River, but a glance at his companion's profile convinced him of the fact that it was not an intentional joke, at least. Then what was it?

"Ah—I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I don't follow you," he said.

"What would yer pa say if he knew?" asked Hammond.

"My father? What about?"

"You were playin' cards with Harvey White: gamblin' with the devil, riskin' everlastin' life for a few minutes of ungodly amusement."

"Oh, hold on. White seems a good sort. And as for gambling, there wasn't even a nickel in sight."

"James, how were you riz?"

"Ah—I beg your pardon?"

"Rizzed? Brought up?"

"Why, just like most fellows, I guess."

"Were you raised in the fear of the Lord?"

"I guess so. Yes, of course."

"An' yet you risk yer immortal soul for a game of cards!"

Jim stared.

"Sorry, but I don't know what you're talking about," he said. "I was brought up in what I suppose you call the fear of the Lord, but what have cards to do with it? I was taught not to lie, not to let down another fellow, not to cheat, never to fight a smaller man than myself, or hit a man when he's down. I was also brought up to respect my elders—but I really must ask you to mind your own business, Mr. Hammond."

"Hah!" exclaimed Hammond, twitching with astonishment. "What's that you said?"

"You heard me, I think," returned Jim calmly.

Hammond looked at him with an expression in his dark, close-set eyes that was at once angry and calculating.

"It ain't neither civil nor wise to talk to me like that," he said.

"If you expect civility from me you must practice it," replied Jim, deliberately meeting and returning the stare.

Hammond's eyes were small, black, and set close together. One contained a suggestion of a squint. Jim's eyes were of normal size and varying hues and shades and set wide. They were gray now. Their look was peculiarly direct. Hammond's were the first to waver and slip aside.

The narrow road dipped and rose. The woods sloped down to it on the left, and on the right the wooded bank dipped steeply to the river. The big grays trotted wherever the road was level.

For twenty minutes after the battle of eyes, Amos Hammond drove in silence, looking straight ahead, and James Todhunter sat in silence beside him and studied the landscape with interest and appreciation. At last Hammond began to hum a lugubrious tune. From that he passed to a livelier one. He ceased humming suddenly and took to whistling. He dropped that as suddenly and sighed profoundly.

"After all's said an' done, a man is only young once," he said.

Jim brightened and smiled.

"What about second childhood?" he returned.

Hammond laughed and smote his knee. His laugh was broken, abrupt, like the yapping of a dog. But it was quite evident to Jim that he was trying to be agreeable.

Wild pastures were passed, and miles of forests, and occasional cultivated and inhabited clearings. Hammond had little to say, but he continued to be as agreeable as his mood and nature permitted. The last mile of the fifteen winding between Covered Bridge and Millbrook was taken by the big grays at a thumping trot.

CHAPTER III
PIPER'S GLEN

There were queer people in Piper's Glen on Racket River—queer by the confused and materialistic standards of more populous communities, at least. The first settlers in the glen had been Ducats—a Frenchman and his Maliseet wife and three half-breed children. At that time there wasn't another clearing within forty miles of the place in any direction. Later, McKims and McElroys came to the glen, and other settlers to other sections of the river; a mill was built twenty miles lower down, and roads were made. Generations passed. Children grew up and married in the glen, or went away with the river into the great world, and died eventually in either case. Ducats married McKims and McElroys and folk from neighboring settlements. Once upon a time there were seven dwellings in Piper's Glen—but that was at the height of its prosperity. It was situated too far from the river to attract people from outside or hold all of its own folk, and too much of its acreage stood too nearly on end for easy or profitable farming. Agriculture was neither arduously nor scientifically followed there. Potatoes and buckwheat were grown sufficient for home consumption, and in winter the men went into the woods, some to chop timber in the camps of big and little "operators," and others to trap fur and kill wild meat.

Young Melchior Hammond from Millbrook visited the Ducats whenever he came to the glen, and that was as often as he could slip away from his father and his father's business. The senior Hammond was not only a storekeeper but a money-lender, and his methods were devious. Melchior became popular with the Ducats, despite his parentage. He was a simple youth, taking his character from the spindle side; and yet he was not without spirit, although not a "white-water boy." He disapproved of his father's dealings with the needy and easy; and when far enough away from home, particularly when in Piper's Glen, he was wont to state his disapproval frankly. He never came to the glen without a pocketful of cigars for old Hercules Ducat and old Archie McKim, and a box of candy for Flora Ducat; and he never refused to sit into a game of cards with Peter and Uncle Sam and Mark Ducat, though it was known to all that Amos Hammond looked upon a pack of cards as fifty-two admission tickets to hell. To be caught by his father in the act of ruffling a deck would cost Melchior his home and his inheritance, and yet the young man never refused to sit in at forty-fives or black-jack or poker under the Ducat roof, though he was seldom a winner. But he did not give all his time in Piper's Glen to the playing of cards. He devoted part of it to conversation with Flora.

It was easy to see that Melchior Hammond, like several others of the young men of the district, thought Flora Ducat much to be admired. Also, her brother Mark was man to be cultivated. Title of Cock of the River was a revered one in that part of the country.

CHAPTER IV
THE ROAD TO PIPER'S GLEN

Millbrook joins Racket River from the west, and the village of Millbrook lies about the junction of the two streams. The mill from which the brook derives its name was built by an early settler, generations ago, and is now no more than a broken wall of masonry on a bank, and a few slimy, silted timbers beneath the brown water showing where the dam has been. It had been a gristmill, but now no wheat is grown in that country and the settlers buy their flour in barrels from Amos Hammond and haul their buckwheat to Covered Bridge to be ground.

The Hammond household, considered as a whole, proved to be unlike anything Jim Todhunter had ever known or imagined. Mrs. Hammond, colorless and thin, with apprehensive, faded blue eyes, a furtive manner and the voice of a peacock; Melchior Hammond, loutish, high-colored, with eyes as dark as his father's but less closely set against his nose; Alice, who seemed at first to possess no distinguishing feature or characteristic save a wavering blush and a trick of drooping the eyelids; Jane, remarkable for two pigtails, freckles, and a sly smile; and Sam, a small boy with the most objectionable and forward manners imaginable. Of such materials was the domestic circle composed into which Amos Hammond introduced young Jim Todhunter, who had once dreamed of Yale, who had inherited an enthusiasm for adventure and the out-of-doors, but who had been brought up in an environment as different from all this as it was possible to be. And the setting of the Hammond household was as strange and astonishing to Jim Todhunter as were the people themselves.

Hammond took Jim over to the store.

"Mel, you show James 'round," he said to his son. "I got to write a few letters. Show 'im the stock an' learn 'im somethin' about the way we do business in this part of the world. I'll look out for customers."

Melchior led Jim to the back of the dusky store, out of earshot and eyeshot of his father.

"How'd ye get along with the old man?" he whispered.

"Not very well, I'm afraid," replied Jim frankly. "He seemed rather peeved with me several times."

Melchior's somewhat sullen face brightened.

"Maybe ye ain't scart enough of the Lord to suit 'im?" he suggested eagerly.

"I don't know about that, but he was all worked up about my playing black-jack with White at Covered Bridge. He was quite rude about it, and I'm afraid I told him where to get off at."

"Told the old man——!" exclaimed Melchior. "Played cards with Harvey White? Say, you'll do! You ain't the kind I expected. I been lookin' for some sort of a feeble-minded guy. Thought you must be to be fool enough to come way up here for the fun of helpin' run a store. How happened it, anyhow? You must have been took in by someone, you and the man that wrote about you."

"My uncle's friend did what he considered most useful in helping me come to a country that interested me," said Jim coldly. "He is a big business man. Stick to a subject you understand."

"I didn't mean to say anything to fuss ye up," returned Melchior hastily. "I was only sayin'—but I guess him an' you didn't know how things are done in this country, or he wouldn't of suggested you invest any money in any business of my old man's, or he wouldn't of sent you to Millbrook to learn it. But you won't learn it, not the way I size ye up."

"What's wrong with the business?" asked Jim anxiously.

"You keep yer eye skinned an' I reckon ye'll know soon enough; an' I reckon that's as much as I got any right to say," answered Melchior. "But I'll tell ye this much more, Jim. I wish ye'd keep a holt on yer money till you take a good look 'round. There are plenty better buys in this country than a chance to sweat yer everlastin' life out for Amos Hammond."

Jim was surprised and distressed by Melchior's talk. It startled him to hear a son talk so of a father; and yet he believed the son to be wise in his generation. He held no brief for the father. The high, bitterly high, moral tone of the trader's conversation had not fooled the youth from the South for a minute.

That night and the next day and the next night passed without any incident of startling significance in the Hammond household. On the morning of the second day after young Todhunter's arrival, there was a flare-up at breakfast between Hammond and his son.

"I'm goin' out Kingswood way to-day, an' you come along with me, Mel," said Hammond.

"I gotter tend store," returned Melchior, sullenly.

"No, you ain't. James can tend store by himself to-day, an' Alice will lend him a hand if business is rushin', which ain't likely."

"There's a man comin' to see me about tradin' rifles to-day."

"Even if that's so, ye won't make a trade when I ain't around to see you ain't cheated."

"I reckon I can do my own tradin'. I'd sooner get cheated on a gun-trade with a man than be seen with you 'round Kingswood."

"Mel!" cried Mrs. Hammond, white to the lips. "Mel! Have a care what you say, for my sake!"

"Shut yer face!" screamed Hammond at the woman, with a black, jumping glare out of his eyes that looked like murder. She bowed her head. He turned to Melchior, trembling with rage. "Do you come along with me, or d'ye go yer own way from this time forrad?" he asked in a terrible whisper.

Melchior was silent, a picture of shamed and sullen defeat. He sat hunched in his chair, his head hanging, his face red as fire.

Hammond and his son drove off in a light wagon immediately after breakfast, to be gone all day. Jim Todhunter went to the store. The bright morning dragged slowly toward noon, but no customers came to buy, sell, or trade. Jim went to the front door and looked out rebelliously at the village, the river, and the hills. The village could be seen at a glance, for it was nothing more than a cluster of a dozen buildings from which ill-tilled farms receded up the valley and back among the hills. Beyond, on every side, the forests dipped and climbed, and drove wedges of dusky firs and glowing maples down between the clearings.

After the mid-day dinner, which was eaten in nervous silence, even young Sam seemed subdued. Jim took his shotgun from its case and filled a pocket with shells. Thus equipped, he returned to the store. For an hour he idled there, growing more deeply disgusted with himself and Amos Hammond and the store every minute. This lolling among barrels and bags was not what he had built his hopes upon, and Hammond was not what he had expected. At the end of the hour he locked up, took the keys over to the house and hung them on their nail just within the front door and walked away. He walked up the road, across the short bridge that spanned Millbrook, with the gun in the crook of his right arm. He walked fast, cleared the village in a minute, and was soon beyond the farthest of the inlying farms.

The brown river brawled with rocks and obstructing ledges on his right, and the wooded hills shouldered down on his left. The road was never level for more than a hundred yards at a stretch. On the rises it was overhung by big birches and maples and pines; spruces crowded it, and in the lowest hollows ancient cedars and hemlocks made a dusky tunnel for it.

Young Todhunter had gone about two miles when a covey of ruffed-grouse puffed up suddenly from the edge of the road and whirred off into the woods. Jim caught no more than a glimpse of short wings and hurtling bodies, but that was enough. His blood raced and his spirits lifted. Hammond's queer eyes and beastly temper, the crude commercial odors of the store, Mrs. Hammond's frightened eyes, the plush-covered chairs and the misinformation of his uncle's friend were all forgotten in the flash of the wild wings. Jim slipped two shells into the gun and went forward alertly.

An hour later, Jim came to a fork in the road and paused to consider his way. The straight road continued beside the river, the branch went off to the left at an angle of about seventy degrees. Both looked promising. The valley of the river was deeper and narrower now, the hills higher and more irregular, the forests less broken. The slosh and roar of white water came up from the river. The branch road led up a shadowed glen between abrupt hills; and down this glen a small brook sang over mossy rocks, slipped under a short bridge of logs and vanished among dense brush in its dive to the river. Both roads looked wild and inviting, but that branching to the left looked the wilder and the less used of the two.

Jim turned to the left and went up the glen. The pockets of his shooting-jacket bulged with the brace of birds he had killed. He had scored three misses, but he was pleased with himself, the birds, and the gun. Never had he seen harder flying birds than these big grouse that were locally known as partridges, and never had he shot under more difficult, more sporting, conditions. The odds were with the bird every time. A puff and whirr of wings, a glimpse of flight and he was lost in the screening foliage. It was the sort of shooting that appealed to Jim, who preferred the sport to the kill. His enthusiasm carried him on and on, and he lost all track of time. His nerves got a jolt once when several deer jumped the road close in front of him, in the gloom, and he realized it was very late. Indeed, so far had he traveled, and so gone was his sense of direction, that it was past eleven when he reached the Hammond house. All the doors were locked, front, side, and back, He was again conscious of that sudden core of heat in his chest. He was about to swing a leg and drive a toe of a substantial boot against the front door when a thought of Mrs. Hammond's frightened eyes caused him to change his mind.

There was a nip of frost in the air, but no wind. Jim passed the remainder of the night very comfortably half a mile above the village, at the edge of the river, beside a good fire of driftwood. He slept soundly until dawn, then swam for a few minutes in the swift, tingling river and returned to the house. The doors were unlocked. He entered the front hall, left his gun and birds there, brushed down his hair with his hands and walked into the dining-room, where the family sat at breakfast. All the Hammonds were present. All heads were raised and some were turned. All eyes were fixed upon the young man who had been out all night.

"Good morning, Mrs. Hammond. Good morning all," said Jim.

"Where you been?" asked Amos Hammond, darkly.

"Out, as you know. Walked too far," answered Jim. "I found all the doors locked when I got back, so I slept down by the river."

"I lock the doors at ten o'clock sharp. This here's a respectable house, a God-fearin' home! Went away right after dinner an' come home later than that. Who give you leave to quit the store?"

"No one gave me leave to quit the store. I didn't ask any one's permission. I went away soon after dinner, as you say, and returned soon after eleven. I went shooting. What have you to say about it?"

"Well, that ain't the worst, maybe. It was all wrong, but I reckon it wasn't the worst. Where'd ye go to? That's what I wanter know."

"Is that all? Now listen to me, Hammond! I don't like you, your looks, your talk, or your manners! You're a four-flusher, and I suspect you of being a crook. You have a bad eye, and I rather suspect that your reputation is rotten. You and your old shop and queer business can go to the devil, for all I care! I am quitting right now."

"Damn you!" cried Hammond in a cracked voice, coming swiftly out of his chair with the bread-knife in his hand and murder in his eyes.

"That's no language for a man of your exalted moral qualities," returned Jim. "And remember the ladies! Put that knife down, or something unpleasant will happen to you."

Hammond slumped down on to the chair and dropped the knife, and some of the madness faded out of his black eyes.

"I'll have the law on ye for this!" he cried.

"What law?" asked the other, pleasantly.

"Get out!"

"I'll breakfast first," said Jim, seating himself at the table.

Hammond glared for a minute, speechless at last, then bolted from the room. Jim ate with a good appetite.

"Jim, you got the nerve!" exclaimed Melchior. "If I had half yer nerve I'd been out of this a year ago. But he'll do you, fer all yer nerve."

Jim smiled noncommittally and buttered a hot biscuit.

"Please don't go away," whispered Mrs. Hammond. "He-he seems to be scared of you. I feel kinder safer—an' the children, too—with you in the house, Mr. Todhunter."

Jim glanced at her and then across the table at Alice. The girl raised her drooping lids slowly and gave him a slow, wide-eyed, glowing, point-blank look.

"That's right," she said.

"But he has told me to go," returned Jim. "And I'll be delighted to."

"He didn't mean it," said Melchior. "He'll be beggin' you to stop forever as soon as he gets a holt on his temper. Let you go—a rich young feller like you!—before he's skinned you. Not much!"

"But I'm not rich. I'm poor."

"You poor! With that gun an' that rifle an' all those pairs of boots an' five fancy fishin'-rods! Tell another, Jim!"

"Please stop a spell longer," begged Mrs. Hammond. "You got a way with him I ain't seen in any one else, man or woman. It's like he was scared of you, or of yer folks in the States, or something. It's a great comfort to me, whatever's the reason of it."

So Jim promised to remain longer, if possible—but entirely on his own terms.

Jim and Melchior left the house and went over to the store. Amos was already there, talking to a customer. The young men retired to the back of the premises.

"Look at 'im now," whispered Melchior. "Would ye think he'd been mad enough to bite a chunk outer his own ear only fifteen minutes ago? Not on yer life! He's a wonder! Wait till Sunday and you hear 'im at meetin'. Say, it would make me laugh if I wasn't his own son. Wish I could handle 'im like you do. I noticed you didn't tell 'im where ye'd been last night, after all."

"No, I didn't, though he's welcome to the information," replied Jim. "I was shooting along a road up-river that turns off to the left—"

"Piper's Glen," interrupted Melchior. "Was you up to Peter Ducat's?"

"I wasn't anywhere. I had a time finding my way back. I met Mr. Merton on the road and went to his house. I dined there—that's all. But I like the looks of Piper's Glen."

"Sure you do—but you look out for Mark Ducat!"

"Who's he? And why should I look out for him?"

"Who's Mark Ducat? He's one of them Ducats of Piper's Glen who don't fear nothin' livin' or dead. He's old Peter Ducat's son an' the smartest man with his hands an' feet on Racket River; an' he's the lad who don't let no young feller he can't lick roam around his part of the country."

"I'd like to meet him," said Jim.

"You better not," returned Melchior earnestly.

CHAPTER V
THE COCK OF THE ROAD

It was even as Melchior had said: Amos Hammond sought and found an opportunity before noon to speak alone with Jim Todhunter, and begged the young man to forget his outbreak of temper and remain under his roof.

"Why do you want me to stay?" asked Jim. "I have decided not to have anything to do with your business, and I won't stand for any of your impudence or tyranny."

"It would look bad, bad for both of us, if we was to break so soon; and yer friends in the States would be real disappointed," replied Hammond.

"I'll give it another try," returned Jim, "but I warn you to keep a grip on that nasty temper of yours. You may commit murder some day, if you're not careful—or get yourself killed."

He did not explain that his only reason for remaining was Mrs. Hammond's hysterical request. Hammond might know it or not, without being told it: Jim didn't care, one way or the other.

Amos Hammond was a model husband, father, and host at dinner that day—in everything but appearance. His appearance was against him. He did not look in the least like the thing he was evidently trying to act and sound like. His grace before meat was lengthy and intimate; and even while he intoned it through his nose, with bowed head and tight-shut eyes, Melchior leaned sideways and whispered in Jim's ear, "An' yesterday he foreclosed on a poor widow woman over to Kingswood Settlement!"

Jim slipped away from Melchior soon after dinner and set off up the river road with his gun under his arm. Though his glance was on the road ahead his thoughts were elsewhere, and several birds got up and away without drawing his fire. He made one shot before reaching the fork of the roads, dropping the big grouse dead as a stone as it whirred from cover to cover. Again he took the road to the left, which led up Piper's Glen. At times he walked fast, as if in a hurry to arrive somewhere, and at times he dawdled as if he had no objective and all the time in the calendar to fritter away. He was walking briskly, with a purposeful air, when he was suddenly and unexpectedly accosted by a man who sat on a mossy boulder in the deep shade beside the road.

"Where ye a-goin' to so fast?" asked the stranger, in a drawling voice.

Jim halted with a jerk, for this voice was the first intimation he had received of the other's presence.

"Beg pardon?" he returned.

The stranger arose from the boulder and stepped to the middle of the road. He moved with a slouching swagger, and the small black mustache midway his swarthy face was lifted slightly at the tips by a cryptic smile. Jim judged him to be five or six years older than himself, of his own height or within an inch of it, and a few pounds less than himself in bone and muscle. Jim made his observations and formed his judgments in a single glance of the eye.

"I asked where ye a-goin' to so fast?" repeated the stranger.

"Along this road," replied Jim.

"That's as may be," returned the woodsman.

"I suppose you are Mark Ducat," said Jim, pleasantly.

"That's me. Ye've heered o' me, hey? Well, I reckon that's all that's needed. Todhunter's yer name, an' ye're from Hammond's. But I don't hold that agin ye, for maybe ye ain't seen through Amos Hammond yet."

"I've seen enough of him to believe almost anything bad of him."

"That's the way to talk! Maybe ye was figgerin' on makin' us a visit. There's quite a raft o' Ducats within a mile o' where we stand, an' they'd all be proud to know ye. Come along."

"Delighted! You're very kind," returned Jim.

They walked onward side by side.

"Slick lookin' gun ye got there," remarked Ducat.

Jim handed it over for the woodsman's closer inspection. It was greatly admired and politely returned.

"Think ye can fight?" asked Mark Ducat.

"Might," returned Jim.

"Look-a-here, Todhunter—I don't know yer baptism name—I like ye! An' I'm goin' to talk right out to yer face, for yer own good an' my satisfaction. I can't say fairer nor that, I guess."

"My front name's Jim. Fire away!"

"Well, now, Jim, I'm Cock o' the River."

"All right," said Jim. "But I can still walk in the woods."

At that moment a girl appeared around a bend in the road ahead, within twenty yards of them. At sight of them she ran forward. They turned to her, and Jim lifted his cap. She was a tall girl of about eighteen, perhaps. In the first glance, Jim noticed her eyes more particularly than anything else about her, for they were green—green of several tints and shades, full of light and of strange depths, like clear, green water running over dark, vivid moss.

"You tell 'im, Flora," said Ducat. "He's kinder pig-headed an' don't get the idee. He's for goin' around here any time he feels like it."

"Mark's a dangerous man to cross," said the girl to Jim. "He's never been licked in a fight yet, and for two years he's fought every man who's come to these parts."

"Sorry, but that's no reason for my staying away," returned Jim.

"Then look out for yerself!" cried Mark.

Jim stepped backward two paces and in the same movement tossed his gun and coat to the moss beside the track. Mark sprang at him and missed him by an inch. Mark then swung for the jaw, but his fist was deflected by a forearm that felt like wood. Then he hooked for the stomach, but landed on a thigh as hard as rock and received a nasty jab behind the ear.

"Watch his feet!" cried the girl.

But Jim was already watching, for he knew something of fights in lumber camps. Yet Mark did not kick just then. Instead, he lowered his head and charged like a bull, only to go plunging blindly past his objective with a cut cheek. He came back quick as a mink and tried to clinch, but Jim broke his hold and hurled him across the narrow road. And again he came back, his swarthy face livid with rage and smeared with blood, his dark eyes glinting. He feinted with both hands, then suddenly snapped up his right leg until knee and chin almost met and shot his foot forward. It was quickly done, but not quickly enough to achieve the desired result. Jim had made a violent but calculated effort to escape, a half-turn and a backward jerk, and the heel of the boot caught him on the left shoulder with reduced force instead of full-force on the chest. It landed on a pad of muscle that would have protected the bone beneath from the kick of a mule. But he staggered slightly and swore softly. The other plunged almost to the knees in recovering his balance.

"Dirty work!" said Jim. "I don't like it! I've seen quite enough of your damned silly gymnastics for one day!"

He pranced forward as he spoke. Mark flailed at him and fanned the wind. He knocked lightly on Mark's nose with his left, then closed for a few seconds and drummed on lean ribs, then jumped clear, side-stepped a rush and planted behind Mark's ear that which was known as the "Todhunter Snifter" at a certain school, famous for its athletes, where more than the usual curriculum is taught. Mark continued on his way along the mossy road for a dozen paces, slumping lower and lower with every pace as if the weight of the snifter was more than his knees and shoulders could support, and at last pitched forward on to the moss with the air of a weary man succumbing to the pressure of a crushing load at the end of a long portage.

"Soul alive!" exclaimed Flora. "Was that your fist?"

Jim nodded and smiled, but he kept his eye on Mark.

"And I was afraid he would bash you all up," said Flora.

Mark scrambled to his feet, turned, stood unsteadily for a few seconds, staring at Jim with a dazed look in his eyes, then advanced, with swinging fists and wavering gait.

"You've had enough," said Jim.

"T'hell ye say!" cried Mark, thickly. "Enough be damned! Look out for yerself! I'm a-comin'!"

"Easy, Mister! Please hit him easy this time!" exclaimed Flora.

Again Jim nodded and smiled, but his eye was on the groggy but unvanquished Cock of the River.

"Wha's that?" cried Mark. "Easy, d'ye say? Hit yer durndest an' be damned to you! I ain't bested yet!"

With that he charged. Jim side-stepped. Again Mark charged and again Jim avoided him lightly. Mark leaped again, and this time Jim stood his ground, and Mark ran his poor face violently against a fending left fist that felt like a bagful of stones. Ducat staggered dizzily backward. His face streamed with blood.

"You are beaten," said Jim.

For reply, Mark lowered his head and butted like a ram. Jim swung low to the jaw as he stepped aside.

Jim picked Mark Ducat up from the mossy track and carried him to the brook, and there he and Flora Ducat bathed the cuts and bruises.

"I tried not to mess him up any more than I could help," he said to the girl. "There was no need, after landing that one behind his ear. I didn't touch his eyes, you see."

As if in response to that statement, Mark opened his eyes.

"Jim, that's the first lickin' I ever got since my old man quit larrupin' me," he said. "If I hadn't seen you do it, I wouldn't believe it; an' if I hadn't seen how ye done it I'd say ye done it with an ax."

"It was just a matter of knowing how," replied Jim modestly. "I boxed seven years on end at school. Fact is, I pulled down the Middleweight Interschool Cup last year. It's about the only thing I do well."

"Say, I wish I'd 'tended the same school ye did!"

"If you had, we'd still be hammering away at each other, battling through twenty rounds to a draw!"

"Sure, Jim, yer word's good enough fer me on that subject; an' now I reckon ye're free to visit these parts as often as ye choose to, for all of me."

"Of course. On general principles I always protest against any unreasonable and unwarranted attempt to restrict my movements."

"You sure protested! Well, let's be gettin' home. Gimme a hand up, Jim, for I'm still feelin' like as if a brow of logs had went over the back of my neck."

The lure of Piper's Glen

THE LURE OF PIPER'S GLEN

CHAPTER ITHE COCK OF THE RIVER

CHAPTER IIYOUNG TODHUNTER

CHAPTER IIIPIPER'S GLEN

CHAPTER IVTHE ROAD TO PIPER'S GLEN

CHAPTER VTHE COCK OF THE ROAD

CHAPTER I
THE COCK OF THE RIVER

CHAPTER II
YOUNG TODHUNTER

CHAPTER III
PIPER'S GLEN

CHAPTER IV
THE ROAD TO PIPER'S GLEN

CHAPTER V
THE COCK OF THE ROAD