The forester looked at him with renewed interest. "As a patrol," he remarked, "you would have to deal with grown men. You would find yourself in many situations that you could not handle. Grown men do not like to take orders from boys." "I have handled men, sir; that is, I have helped to handle them. I helped to capture the German dynamiters at Elk City, sir, when the Camp Brady Wireless Patrol saved that place from destruction." "Are you a member of that organization?" asked the forester with increasing interest. "I remember reading about that." "We both are," said Charley. "And I could help you so much with my wireless, sir. Your ranger told us this morning that if he found a fire he couldn't handle, he would have to go clear out to the highway before he could summon help. With the wireless, help could be summoned almost instantly." The forester smiled indulgently. "It sounds good," he commented. "But you forget that we have no wireless and that none of us knows anything about radio-telegraphy. No; I am afraid I can't use you, though I'd like to. If you still want a job when you are of age, come to me. I can use you as a patrol and I might even have a place for you as a ranger. We have mighty few rangers as well educated and equipped as you will be. Or you might even decide to go to Mont Alto and take a degree in forestry and become a forester like myself. I would like to see you in the service, but I can't take you in now. I must get on with my work and hurry back to my office. Good-bye and good luck to you. And don't forget about your fires." Turning to the elder of his two companions, he said, "All right, Finnegan. Go ahead." The man stepped to the nearest tree, slipped his calipers on it breast-high, then glanced aloft. "White pine, forty-three, five," he called. The forester put down the figures in his cruising book. "Hemlock, twenty-eight, four," called the other man. The men were experienced timber cruisers. They were measuring the amount of wood in the forest. The first man meant that the white pine tree he was measuring was forty-three inches in diameter breast-high and would make five standard logs, each sixteen feet long. The second scaler had measured a hemlock twenty-eight inches in diameter and long enough for four logs. They were measuring the timber on a few acres, so as to form an estimate of the amount for sale. The work interested Lew greatly, but Charley had no heart for anything. He had fought hard and apparently his last chance had slipped away from him.