The Rules of the Game

  VIII

  Bob was awakened before daylight by the unholy shriek of a greatwhistle. He then realized that for some time he had been vaguely awareof kindling and stove sounds. The bare little room had become bitterlycold. A gray-blackness represented the world outside. He lighted hisglass lamp and took a hasty, shivering sponge bath in the crockerybasin. Then he felt better in the answering glow of his healthy,straight young body; and a few moments later was prepared to enjoy afragrant, new-lit, somewhat smoky fire in the big stove outside hisdoor. The bell rang. Men knocked ashes from their pipes and arose; othermen stamped in from outside. The dining room was filled.

  Bob took his seat, nodding to the men. A slightly grumpy silencereigned. Collins and Fox had not yet appeared. Bob saw Roaring Dick atthe other table, rather whiter than the day before, but carrying himselfboldly in spite of his poor head. As he looked, Roaring Dick caught hiseye. The riverman evidently did not recognize having seen the youngstranger the day before; but Bob was again conscious of the quick impactof the man's personality, quite out of proportion to his diminutiveheight and slender build. At the end of ten minutes the men trooped outnoisily. Shortly a second whistle blew. At the signal the mill awoke.The clang of machinery, beginning slowly, increased in tempo. Theexultant shriek of the saws rose to heaven. Bob, peering forth into theyoung daylight, caught the silhouette of the elephantine tram horse,high in the air, bending his great shoulders to the starting of hislittle train of cars.

  Not knowing what else to do, Bob sauntered to the office. It was lockedand dark. He returned to the boarding house, and sat down in the mainroom. The lamps became dimmer. Finally the chore boy put them out. Thenat last Collins appeared, followed closely by Fox.

  "You didn't get up to eat with the men?" the bookkeeper asked Bob atrifle curiously. "You don't need to do that. We eat with Mrs. Hallowellat seven."

  At eight o'clock the little bookkeeper opened the office door andushered Bob in to the scene of his duties.

  "You're to help me," said Collins concisely. "I have the books. Ourother duties are to make out time checks for the men, to answer thecorrespondence in our province, to keep track of camp supplies, and tokeep tab on shipments and the stock on hand and sawed each day. There'syour desk. You'll find time blanks and everything there. The copyingpress is in the corner. Over here is the tally board," He led the way toa pine bulletin, perhaps four feet square, into which were screwed ahundred or more small brass screw hooks. From each depended a small pinetablet or tag inscribed with many figures. "Do you understand a tallyboard?" Collins asked.

  "No," replied Bob.

  "Well, these screw hooks are arranged just like a map of the lumberyards. Each hook represents one of the lumber piles--or rather thelocation of a lumber pile. The tags hanging from them represent thelumber piles themselves; see?"

  "Sure," said Bob. Now that he understood he could follow out on thisstrange map the blocks, streets and alleys of that silent, tenantlesscity.

  "On these tags," pursued Collins, "are figures. These figures show howmuch lumber is in each pile, and what kind it is, and of what quality.In that way we know just what we have and where it is. The sealersreport to us every day just what has been shipped out, and what has beenpiled from the mill. From their reports we change the figures on thetags. I'm going to let you take care of that."

  Bob bestowed his long figure at the desk assigned him, and went to work.He was interested, for it was all new to him. Men were constantly in andout on all sorts of errands. Fox came to shake hands and wish him well;he was off on the ten o'clock train. Bob checked over a long invoice ofcamp supplies; manipulated the copying press; and, under Collins'sinstructions, made out time checks against the next pay day. Theinsistence of details kept him at the stretch until noon surprised him.

  After dinner and a breath of fresh air, he plunged again into his tasks.Now he had the scalers' noon reports to transfer to the tally board. Hewas intensely interested by the novelty of it all; but even this earlyhe encountered his old difficulties in the matter of figures. He made nomistakes, but in order to correlate, remember and transfer correctly hewas forced to an utterly disproportionate intensity of application. Tothe tally board he brought more absolute concentration and will-powerthan did Collins to all his manifold tasks. So evidently painstaking washe, that the little bookkeeper glanced at him sharply once or twice.However, he said nothing.

  When darkness approached the bookkeeper closed his ledger and came overto Bob's desk. In ten minutes he ran deftly over Bob's afternoon work;re-checking the supply invoices, verifying the time checks, comparingthe tallies with the scalers' reports. So swiftly and accurately did heaccomplish this, with so little hesitation and so assured a belief inhis own correctness that the really taxing job seemed merely a bit oflight mental gymnastics after the day's work.

  "Good!" he complimented Bob; "everything's correct."

  Bob nodded, a little gloomily. It might be correct; but he was verytired from the strain of it.

  "It'll come easier with practice," said Collins; "always difficult to doa new thing."

  The whistle blew. Bob went directly to his room and sat down on theedge of his bed. In spite of Collins's kindly meant reassurances, theiron of doubt had entered his soul. He had tried for four months, andwas no nearer facility than when he started.

  "If a man hadn't learned better than that, I'd have called him a dub andtold him to get off the squad," he said to himself, a little bitterly.He thought a moment. "I guess I'm tired. I must buck up. If Collins andArchie can do it, I can. It's all in the game. Of course, it takes timeand training. Get in the game!"