“No,” he retorted. “It’s Kollock--Curly Kollock.” Bob frowned slightly. “Indeed! Any relation to Bill?” “His brother.” The frown deepened and there was silence for a moment. Bill Kollock, the “trouble man” of Elihu Crane and his associates in the Lumber Trust, was not a character to commend himself to Bainbridge. The brother was more than likely to be of the same breed, he reflected as he stared with hard, narrowing eyes at the flushed, defiant face of the boy before him. And yet---- “Well?” snapped the boy suddenly. “I s’pose this means git my time?” Bob raised his eyebrows. “Why so?” he inquired coldly. Kollock shrugged his shoulders with an exaggerated nonchalance and ease which defeated its purpose. “I don’t reckon you’re very keen about having a Kollock on your drive,” he retorted. “That’s where you guess wrong,” returned Bainbridge, with a sudden bland indifference. “If you want to quit, of course, that’s your own affair; but as for laying you off, I never fire a good workman because his family doesn’t happen to be to my liking. So far as anything really underhand is concerned”--he paused for a second and looked the boy square in the eyes--“I’m not afraid of that--from you.” Without waiting for a reply, he turned and strode on along the river bank, leaving young Curly to stare after him, his face flushed, and a curious, unwonted expression in his blue eyes. CHAPTER VIII. THE EMPTY BOX As soon as the drive was actually started on its way downstream, Bob made haste to bring some sort of order out of the chaos he had found. Having watched the men at work, he was able to get some slight idea of their capabilities, which was vitally necessary in dividing them into the “rear” and the “jam” crew. The latter, in charge of a hastily appointed foreman, went forward to take charge of the head of the drive. The work of the rear comprised setting stranded logs afloat, breaking up incipient jams, and other duties too numerous to mention. The men composing the squad were always the most skillful and experienced in the gang. They had to be continually on the alert, working usually at high tension, and more than half the time in icy water to their waists. They had to be able to ride anything in the shape of a log in any sort of water, and work day after day for twelve and fourteen hours at a stretch. They must be swift as lightning in their movements, and possessed of judgment, ability, and nerve. It was impossible, of course, for Bob to pick out an ideal rear crew from merely having seen the men in action for a scant few minutes. He did not try. He simply used his very excellent judgment, reserving mentally the right to change his mind whenever he felt like it, and juggle the men around as he chose.