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The strain made him more shaky than usual, and when telegrams began to flutter in from Radway's relatives a few days later Radway had left no address and so they had been forced to wire to the Halbertons he threw up the sponge altogether. His weakness was Considine's opportunity.
"The young feller's all right," observed Heath; "he cuffed Ben up to a peak all right." "Went down like a peck of wet fish-nets," replied Jackson tranquilly. In the office shanty one evening about a week later, Radway and his scaler happened to be talking over the situation.
"But Paul meant something else," declared Jud Elderkin, wisely. "You see, if only that rain does come, and it's heavy enough, there's going to be a lot more water in this old canal than we need to pull through with. You know how quick the Bushkill River rises; and I guess it's the same way with the Radway." "Oh! don't we wish that there'll just be a little old cloud-burst!" cried Gusty Bellows.
"Well, it's a rough country," apologized Radway, trying, as was his custom, to find excuses for the other party as soon as he was agreed with in his blame, "there's any amount of potholes; and, then, we've had so much snow the ground ain't really froze underneath. It gets pretty soft in some of them swamps. Can't figure on putting up as much in this country as we used to down on the Muskegon."
"How is that?" "I don' no," confessed Hines, "but she is. She jest feels that way." In the morning the icicles dripped from the roof, and although the snow did not appreciably melt, it shrank into itself and became pock-marked on the surface. Radway was down looking at the road. "She's holdin' her own," said he, "but there ain't any use putting more water on her. She ain't freezing a mite.
At the edge of the wood a bird flew out of a thorn tree. "It's a brown owl," cried Radway; but when its wings caught the moonlight they saw the band of white. "It's a magpie," she said. "One for sorrow ..." and smiled. Roscarna stood before them, the ghost of a great house with many solemn windows for eyes. It looked blank, uninhabited, lifeless.
I'll boss their gangs and make their roads and see to their logging for 'em, but it's got to be THEIRS. No! I'm going to be a free man by the G. jumping Moses!" Thorpe dedicated a musing instant to the incongruity of rejoicing over a freedom gained by ceasing to be master and becoming servant. "Radway," said he suddenly, "I need money and I need it bad.
The scaler smiled a thin smile all to himself behind the stove. Big John Radway depended so much on the moral effect of approval or disapproval by those with whom he lived. It amused Dyer to withhold the timely word, so leaving the jobber to flounder between his easy nature and his sense of what should be done. Dyer knew perfectly well that the work was behind, and he knew the reason.
And so the leading motorboat left the noisy waters of the Radway, and glided into the smoother lake, much to the satisfaction of the crew; for the boys had grown tired of the constant need of watchfulness in avoiding reefs and snags. Paul shut off power, and waited to see whether the companion boat succeeded in reaching the calm waters of the big lake as successfully as they had done.
We was going slow enough before, God knows, but even with the rank weather and all, I think we'd have won out, if we could have held the same gait." Radway paused. Thorpe was silent. "The boys thought it was a mighty poor rig, my leaving that way." He paused again in evident expectation of a reply. Again Thorpe was silent. "Didn't they?" Radway insisted. "Yes, they did," answered Thorpe.
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