Here, barring the accident of an extraordinary flood,
the troubles were over. On the broad, placid bosom of the stream
the logs would float. A crew, following, would do the easy work of
sacking what logs would strand or eddy in the lazy current; would
roll into the faster waters the component parts of what were by
courtesy called jams, but which were in reality pile-ups of a few
hundred logs on sand bars mid-stream; and in the growing tepid
warmth of summer would tramp pleasantly along the river trail. Of
course, a dry year would make necessary a larger crew and more
labour; of course, a big flood might sweep the logs past all
defences into the lake for an irretrievable loss. But such floods
come once in a century, and even the dryest of dry years could not
now hang the drive. As Orde sat in his buckboard, ready to go into
town for a first glimpse of Carroll in more than two months, he
gazed with an immense satisfaction over the broad river moving brown
and glacier-like as though the logs that covered it were viscid and
composed all its substance. The enterprise was practically assured
of success.
For a while now Orde was to have a breathing spell. A large number
of men were here laid off.
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