Part 23

“Sure! If you improved the river for driving, she'd be easier to drive. That goes without saying.”

“How many firms drive logs on this stream?”

“Ten,” replied Orde, without hesitation.

“How many men do they employ?”

“Driving?” asked Orde.

“Driving.”

“About five hundred; a few more or less.”

“Now suppose,” Newmark leaned forward impressively, “suppose a firm should be organised to drive ALL the logs on the river. Suppose it improved the river with necessary piers, dams, and all the rest of it, so that the driving would be easier. Couldn't it drive with less than five hundred men, and couldn't it save money on the cost of driving?”

“It might,” agreed Orde.

“You know the conditions here. If such a firm should be organised and should offer to drive the logs for these ten firms at so much a thousand, do you suppose it would get the business?”

“It would depend on the driving firm,” said Orde. “You see, mill men have got to have their logs. They can't afford to take chances. It wouldn't pay.”

“Then that's all right,” agreed Newmark, with a gleam of satisfaction across his thin face. “Would you form a partnership with me having such an object in view?”

Orde threw back his head and laughed with genuine amusement.

“I guess you don't realise the situation,” said he. “We'd have to have a few little things like distributing booms, and tugs, and a lot of tools and supplies and works of various kinds.”

“Well, we'd get them.”

It was now Orde's turn to ask questions.

“How much are you worth?” he inquired bluntly.

“About twenty thousand dollars,” replied Newmark.

“Well, if I raise very much more than twenty thousand cents, I'm lucky just now.”

“How much capital would we have to have?” asked Newmark.

Orde thought for several minutes, twisting the petal of an old apple-blossom between his strong, blunt fingers.

“Somewhere near seventy-five thousand dollars,” he estimated at last.

“That's easy,” cried Newmark. “We'll make a stock company--say a hundred thousand shares. We'll keep just enough between us to control the company--say fifty-one thousand. I'll put in my pile, and you can pay for yours out of the earnings of the company.”

“That doesn't sound fair,” objected Orde.

“You pay interest,” explained Newmark. “Then we'll sell the rest of the stock to raise the rest of the money.”

“If we can,” interjected Orde.

“I think we can,” asserted Newmark.

Orde fell into a brown study, occasionally throwing a twig or a particle of earth at the offending lump in the turf. Overhead the migratory warblers balanced right-side up or up-side down, searching busily among the new leaves, uttering their simple calls. The air was warm and soft and still, the sky bright. Fat hens clucked among the grasses. A feel of Sunday was in the air.