This was where the sting lay. Kollock was aggrieved and disgruntled because of what was, to him, a very good reason. There had been a definite object in his pause by that stone. The night before he had received a brief note from Bill, in which he was urged to “make use of any chance you git to do--you know what.” Curly did know “what” very well. It meant that he was to thwart and delay the progress of the drive by any means in his power. _Any_ means! The simplest, of course, was to cause some to happen to Bainbridge himself. Bill had not hesitated to suggest several ways by which this happy end could be reached. None of them appealed particularly to Curly. He was not overscrupulous, but he disliked doing up a man in cold blood without giving him even a ghost of a show. Still, Bill had done him good turns more than once when he was out of work; and, last but not least, there was the financial side of the affair. Curly had never been told who or what was back of these attacks on the independent lumber company, but he knew there was plenty of money in it. All this he had been thinking over as he sat smoking that cigarette. In the end he decided to have nothing to do with it. Bainbridge had trusted him and played square. For that reason he would be equally square and aboveboard, and let this dirty work alone. That was what he _had_ decided, but now---- He gritted his teeth, glared fiercely around, and came to an abrupt stop. Every instinct of the riverman was aroused. On his left the river dropped over short falls into a narrow gorge. It was a spot where things were likely to happen at any time, and where a man or two should have been stationed continually. Curly knew, in fact, that there had been men here all morning. They had been called away for some purpose, leaving the little falls unguarded. And as he stood there his practiced eyes told him that he was beholding the very start of a jam. A log, plunging over the falls, upended. Another was thrust under it. A third and fourth, coming down together, caught on the obstruction, all being held by some stones rising midstream. Before the current could tear them loose several more timbers were forced against the mass which was piling up so swiftly, bridging to the opposite shore. To carry out that angry resolve of a minute or two ago, Curly should have rolled himself another cigarette, and watched the growing damage with a sardonic smile. He did nothing of the sort. For a flash he had forgotten his grievance, and was a “river hog,” pure and simple. The stoppage must be broken before it reached the proportions of a real jam. There was no one else to do it, and so he leaped to the task without a second’s pause for thought.