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When finally Heinzman had driven sadly away, and the whole drive, "H" logs included, was pouring into the main boom, Orde stretched his arms over his head in a luxury of satisfaction. "That just about settles that campaign," he said to Newmark. "Oh, no, it doesn't," replied the latter decidedly. "Why?" asked Orde, surprised. "You don't imagine he'll do anything more?"
Newmark, too, blinked back, although he could by this time see perfectly well. Newmark had known Orde only as a riverman. Like most Easterners, then and now, he was unable to imagine a man in rough clothes as being anything but essentially a rough man. The figure he saw before him was decently and correctly dressed in what was then the proper Sunday costume.
"Rope 'em in," advised Newmark. "It's Saturday, and we don't want to let things simmer over Sunday, if we can help it." About eleven o'clock a clerk of the Welton Lumber Co. entered Mr. Welton's private office to deliver to Orde a note. "This just came by special messenger," he explained. Orde, with an apology, tore it open. It was from Heinzman, and requested an immediate interview.
He's the only big manufacturer up here; the rest are all at Monrovia, where they can get shipping by water. I suppose it costs the other nine firms doing business on the river from two to two and a half a thousand." Newmark produced a note-book and began to jot down figures. "Do these men all conduct separate drives?" he inquired. "All but Proctor and old Heinzman. They pool in together."
You'll have to fix it up with the doctor the cook, I mean," he explained, as Newmark look puzzled. "You'll find him at camp up behind that brush. He's a slim, handsome fellow, with a jolly expression of countenance." He leaped lightly out over the bobbing timbers, leaving Newmark to find his way.
At Newmark's he turned in between the oleanders. Mallock answered his ring. "No, sir, Mr. Newmark is out, sir," said Mallock. "I'll tell him you called, sir," and started respectfully but firmly to close the door. But Orde thrust his foot and knee in the opening. "I'll come in and wait," said he quietly.
Orde's mind was struck chaotic by the reasonableness of this request, and the utter impossibility of acceding to it. "How much of a bond?" he asked. "Twenty-fife thousand vould satisfy us," said Heinzman. "Bring us a suitable bond for that amount and ve vill sign your contract." Orde ran down the stairs to find Newmark.
"If we don't make any dividends at first," Orde pointed out, "I've got to keep even on my interest." "You can't live on five hundred," objected Newmark. "I'll be on the river and at the booms six months of the year," replied Orde, "and I can't spend much there." "I'm satisfied," said Newmark thoughtfully, "I'm getting a little better than good interest on my own investment from the start.
When they came to a cross street, they had to descend to it by a short flight of steps on one side, and ascend from it by a corresponding flight on the other. At the hotel, Newmark seated himself in a rocking-chair next the big window. "Good luck!" said he. Orde mounted a wide, dark flight of stairs that led from the street to a darker hall.
He had constructed his ideal of a friend, with Newmark as a basis; and now that this, which had seemed to him as solid a reality as a brick block, had dissolved into nothing, he found himself in the necessity of refashioning his whole world. He was not angry at Newmark. But he was grieved down to the depths of his being.
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