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Updated: June 6, 2025
And Junko watched, dimly fascinated, in his rudimentary animal's brain, by the sight of the power he had evoked to his aid. When night came the men rode down stream to where the wanigan had made camp. There they slept, often in blankets wetted by the wanigan's eccentricities, to leap to their feet at the first cry in early morning. Some days it rained, in which case they were wet all the time.
Thorpe found himself unexpectedly with Big Junko. For a time they plodded on without conversation. Then the big man ventured a remark. "I'm glad she's over," said he. "I got a good stake comin'." "Yes," replied Thorpe indifferently. "I got most six hundred dollars comin'," persisted Junko. "Might as well be six hundred cents," commented Thorpe, "it'd make you just as drunk."
Perhaps he remembered that zero morning so many years before when he had watched the thinly-clad, shivering chore-boy set his face for the first time towards the dark forest. Big Junko and Anderson deposited their burden on the raised platform of the office steps. Thorpe turned and fronted the crowd.
It was the triumph of what was real in the man over that which environment, alienation, difficulties had raised up within him. At Big Junko's words, Thorpe raised his hammer and with one mighty blow severed the chains which bound the ends of the booms across the opening. The free end of one of the poles immediately swung down with the current in the direction of Big Junko.
Big Junko slipped, caught himself by an effort, overbalanced in the other direction, and fell into the stream. The current at once swept him away, but fortunately in such a direction that he was enabled to catch the slanting end of a "dead head" log whose lower end was jammed in the crib. The dead head was slippery, the current strong; Big Junko had no crevice by which to assure his hold.
"A woman is no excuse for a man's neglecting his work," he snapped. "Shorely not," agreed Junko serenely. "I aim to finish out my time all right, Mr. Thorpe. Don't you worry none about that. I done my best for you.
In another moment he would be torn away. "Let go and swim!" shouted Thorpe. "I can't swim," replied Junko in so low a voice as to be scarcely audible. For a moment Thorpe stared at him. "Tell Carrie," said Big Junko. Then there beneath the swirling gray sky, under the frowning jam, in the midst of flood waters, Thorpe had his second great Moment of Decision.
Big Junko did not know much, and had the passions of a wild animal, but he was a reckless riverman and devoted to Thorpe. Just now he exploded dynamite. The sticks of powder were piled amidships. Big Junko crouched over them, inserting the fuses and caps, closing the openings with soap, finally lighting them, and dropping them into the water alongside, where they immediately sank.
Then they broke the jam, standing surely on the edge of the great darkness, while the ice water sucked in and out of their shoes. Behind the rear Big Junko poled his bateau backwards and forwards exploding dynamite. Many of the bottom tiers of logs in the rollways had been frozen down, and Big Junko had to loosen them from the bed of the stream.
"You damned fool," cried Thorpe exasperated, then held the hammer to him, "strike while I keep the chain underneath," he commanded. Big Junko leaned forward to obey, kicking strongly his caulks into the barked surface of the boom log. The spikes, worn blunt by the river work already accomplished, failed to grip.
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