Two Young Lumbermen by Edward Stratemeyer

Fifteen miles below Tunley was located a large saw- and shingle-mill, where something like two hundred thousand shingles were cut and bundled every working day in the year. The mill also turned out wheel spokes, ax and pick handles, and various other things in wood, everything being done by machinery which was of the most complicated kind.

Owen had been longing to visit this mill, and when he got the chance to go down to Rice's, as it was called, he was delighted. He went on horseback, carrying a band saw that Ulmer Balasco wanted exchanged for another.

Between Tunley and Rice's mill there was a series of rapids in the river, and at this point the young lumberman saw a truly interesting sight. Half a dozen fishermen were out among the rocks in their rubber boots, each with a long spear in his hands. They were watching for salmon, and whenever a fish darted along, one or another would make a quick lunge with his spear. The majority of the lunges were unsuccessful, but occasionally a strike would prove true, and the fisherman would hold the struggling fish aloft and march to the shore in triumph with his prize.

"That's a sport I wouldn't mind trying myself," thought Owen. "It beats watching a float all hollow."

Rice's mill was a long, narrow building built on spiling, and fronting the river. To one side was a pond and yard for extra lumber, and to the rear was a dry kiln. At the front were large, double doors, and from these there was a runway or slide, reaching down into the water. Up this slide were hauled the logs to be cut up for various purposes.

The noise around a mill was familiar to Owen's ears, yet the volume here was greater than he had ever heard before. There was the hum of the saws, the hiss of the planes, and the constant clank-clank so inseparably connected with all mills of this nature. Inside, the sawdust and small shavings were everywhere in evidence, and beams and rafters were coated with a white dust as fine as flour. Patent pipes and suction fans carried the large shavings to the furnaces, and scoops took the sawdust to a pit near by. It was a hot place, and the majority of the workmen wore nothing but their shirts, trousers, and shoes.

"Like to look through, eh? " said the proprietor, after Owen's business was concluded. "All right, go ahead. Or, wait a few minutes and I'll go with you. We've just been setting up a new shingle machine, and she's a dandy," he added enthusiastically.

Accordingly Owen waited around the office while Mr. Rice attended to several orders which a clerk had brought up for his inspection. The majority seemed to be satisfactory, but one order was peremptorily turned down.

"Write to Foxy Hildan and tell him flatly that we can't fill that order unless we get a guarantee for the payment," Owen heard Philip Rice say. "I trusted that man once and got stuck, and I shan't do it again."

"He was here day before yesterday and said it would be all right," answered the clerk, in a low voice.

"Here? I didn't see him."

"It was after you went away. I wanted him to come back and see you about it, but he was in a hurry to get up to Tunley and see Balasco -- said it was something important."

"Is he coming back this way?"

"No, he said he was going on further after his stop at Tunley."

"Did you say anything about a guarantee?"

"No, sir. I didn't know you wanted it."

"Well, write to him and tell him what I said. If he doesn't want to toe the mark we can get along without him. He may be foxy, but he can't play his little game on me. He stuck the Everett people about three thousand dollars, so Panglass said, and he always tells the truth."

"Couldn't they get the money at all? " asked the clerk.

"Not a dollar. You see, Hildan pretended to act only as an agent, and in some way they couldn't hold him for it. Oh, he's as slick as grease. If he wants my shingles he has got to pay cash or give me a cast-iron guarantee," concluded Philip Rice.

Owen could not help but hear this conversation, and it interested him greatly. He had learned that Foxy Hildan had visited Ulmer Balasco two days before, and further, according to Mr. Rice and to a man named Panglass, Hildan was not to be trusted in any business transaction, and had already swindled some Everett timber or shingle dealers out of three thousand dollars.