Tommy Eye sat on his load, still with gaze patiently to the front, waiting in serene confidence the convenience of his employer. That back turned to Wade was the back of the humble confider, the back of the martyr. In his sudden trepidation at thought of his own imperilled interests, were he himself enmeshed in the law, Wade had thought to leave Tommy's possible fate alone. But now, almost without reflection or plan, he ran down the hill. The martyr's serene obliviousness struck a pang to his heart. In those days of strife and toil and understanding Tommy Eye had grown dear to him. Britt, turning, yelled to the officer at the top of the slope, "Give that snub-line a half-hitch and hold that load!" A bit of a rock shelf broadened the road where the logs were halted. Britt lashed his horses around in front of the load with apparent intent to intimidate Tommy. The warden dropped off the jumper and shut off retreat in the rear. And Wade, running swiftly, carrying his cant-dog, came and leaped upon the load and stood above Tommy--his protecting genius, but a genius who had no very clear idea of what he was about to do. No one ever explained exactly how it happened! The warden, who was at the top of the pitch and who did it, gazed a moment, saw what he had done, and fled with a howl of abject terror, never to appear on Enchanted again. The men at the snub-post stated afterwards that he came to them, hearing Pulaski Britt's orders, elbowed them aside with an oath, and took the hawser. He probably undertook to loosen the coils to make a half-hitch; but a game warden has no business with a snub-line when the devil is in it. It gave one triumphant shriek at its release, and then--"Toom! Toom! Toom!"--it began to sing its horrible bass note. It was slipping faster and faster around the snubbing-post under the strain of Tommy Eye's load, which it had been holding back. Tommy Eye knew without looking--knew without understanding. He knew--that most terrible knowledge of all woods terrors--that he was "sluiced." He screamed once--only once--and the horses came into their collars. Their hot breath was on the back of Pulaski Britt's neck when he started--started with a hoarse oath above which sang the shrill yelp of his whip-lash, and behind him, on the icy slope, slid the great load of logs now released from anchorage to the snubbing-post and guided only by the nerve of Tommy Eye. "Jump, Mr. Wade! Jump!" gasped the teamster. But Wade drove the peak of his cant-dog into a log and clung to the upright handle. He looked back. The great hawser spun itself off the spindle of the post and chased down the hill in spirals, utterly loose and free.