"What's your position, and what's your name?" asked John Grier.
"I'm head-foreman of the Skunk Nest's gang--that's this lot, and I got here--just in time! I don't believe you could have done it, Mr. Grier. No master is popular in the real sense with his men. I think they'd have turned you down. So it was lucky I came."
A faint smile hovered at his lips, and his eyes brooded upon the busy gangs of men. "Yes, I've had a lot of luck this time. There's nothing like keeping your head cool and your belly free from drink." Now he laughed broadly. "By gosh, it's all good! Do you know, Mr. Grier, I came out here a wreck eight years ago. I left Montreal then with a spot in my lungs, that would kill me, they said. I've never seen Montreal since, but I've had a good time out in the woods, in the shanties in the winters; on the rivers in the summer. I've only been as far East as this in eight years."
"What do you do in the winter, then?"
"Shanties-shanties all the time. In the summer this; in the Fall taking the men back to the shanties. Bossing the lot; doing it from love of the life that's been given back to me. Yes, this is the life that makes you take things easy. You don't get fussed out here. The job I had took a bit of doing, but it was done, and I'm lucky to have my boss see the end of it."
He smiled benignly upon John Grier. He knew he was valuable to the Grier organization; he knew that Grier had heard of him under another name. Now Grier had seen him, and he felt he would like to tell John Grier some things about the river he ought to know. He waved a hand declining the cigar offered him by his great chief.
"Thanks, I don't smoke, and I don't drink, and I don't chew; but I eat--by gosh, I eat! Nothing's so good as good food, except good reading."
"Good reading!" exclaimed John Grier. "Good reading--on the river!"
"Well, it's worked all right, and I read a lot. I get books from Montreal, from the old library at the University."
"At what University?" struck in the lumber-king. "Oh, Laval! I wouldn't go to McGill. I wanted to know French, so I went to Laval. There I came to know Father Labasse. He was a great man, Father Labasse. He helped me. I was there three years, and then was told I was going to die. It was Labasse who gave me this tip. He said, 'Go into the woods; put your teeth into the trees; eat the wild herbs, and don't come back till you feel well.' Well, I haven't gone back, and I'm not going back."