The noise in camp was almost as bad as in San Francisco. Men shouted at one another, saws screamed, men, mules, and oxen were everywhere. One team of eight yoked oxen lumbered toward them pulling a string of logs that had the bark stripped from them. The animals and logs moved along a strange-looking roadbed made of partially buried logs, which Santana could tell made it easier to drag the fresh-cut logs to the lake. A young gringo, whom she guessed to be no more than fourteen or fifteen, walked in front of the oxen with a bucket and broom, stopping occasionally to swab something from the pail onto the roadbed, then spread it around with the broom.
“Father, what is he doing?” she asked.
Dominic scratched his head. “I do not know. That roadbed was not here when I visited last. It is something new Will has done. I see that it goes far up into the hills, probably to where the trees are being cut. Perhaps the boy there puts something on the logs in the road so that they are more slippery, which would make it easier to pull the big logs across them.”
They made their way carefully around scrap lumber and piles of bark, the smell of fresh-cut wood so strong that it almost hurt Santana’s nose. Suddenly she felt an odd tremble, and her horse reared at a popping noise that turned into a mighty roar, almost like an explosion. The earth shook, and Santana clung to Estrella’s reins, patting her neck to keep her calm. Behind them one of the ranch hands’ horses did rear up and throw its rider.
“Father, an earthquake!” Santana exclaimed.
Dominic laughed. “No, my child. That is simply the sound of one of the big redwoods coming down somewhere above us. I hope no one was hurt. Will has explained it is very dangerous work. The last time I was here one of his men had been badly injured.”
Santana felt a sudden alarm that something could happen to Will. Why did it upset her to think he could be wounded or killed doing this work? Why did she care so much for a man she had not even seen for so long?
They continued toward the mill house, where the painfully loud sawing was taking place, while behind them the man who had been thrown let out a spray of cuss words as he got up from a bed of bark and wood shavings and brushed himself off. Dominic ordered the men to find a decent place to make camp for the night. “We will stay here today and tonight,” he told them before riding on with Santana.
Men who worked for Will glanced at them as they rode by, some nodding and smiling, each one staring at Santana. They were all burly, rugged-looking men, most of them American, although Santana did spot a few Mexicans and even a couple of Indians.
They rounded a corral where more oxen and mules were kept, along with a few horses. As they approached the sawmill, Will himself emerged to see them coming.
Santana’s heart beat faster when she saw him, more handsome than she remembered, looking tired from working hard, but tanned and brawny. It was a hot August day, and he was sweaty, his hair full of sawdust, yet that did little to detract from his good looks and bright smile. She could see the surprise in his eyes at seeing her there, and yes, she saw pleasure. He seemed glad she had come. Had he missed her, thought about her even a little bit?
“Dominic!” he greeted them, brushing sawdust from his shirt and hair.
His shirt was open part of the way, and Santana could see hairs on his chest that trailed up to the dip in his throat. His shoulders and chest were even bigger than she had remembered, and she wondered if she was noticing these things because she was a year older. Lately she had given thought to things she had never considered before, like her own womanliness, noticing how men looked at her…how Will was looking at her now.
“Buenos dias, Senorita Lopez,” he said “I am surprised and pleased to see you here.”
“I wanted to come and see for myself,” she said. “Mi padre has told me so much about what you are doing here. Can I see how you cut the logs with the big saw inside?”
Will looked at Dominic. “It’s a little dangerous in there. She’ll have to stand exactly where I tell her to stand. Fact is, this whole place is dangerous, from the buckers and cutting crews clear down to the finishing mill on the ocean. A lot of these men are still in training. I lost a man just last week.”
“I am sorry to hear that, senor,” Dominic answered as he dismounted. He walked around and helped Santana down from her horse. “My daughter will do whatever you tell her to do, but you had better let her see that saw or she will pester me to my dying day. All she has talked about is coming here to see all of this.”
Will grinned, but Santana could see he was troubled that one of his men had been killed. “How did the man die?” she asked.
Will led her and Dominic toward the mill. “One of my fallers was smashed in the head by a huge trunk that walked across its stump when it was falling. He died instantly, thank God.”
“Walked across a stump?” Santana stopped walking. “What does that mean?”
Will turned to look at her, fighting urges that he thought would have been buried after not seeing her for all this time. But she was more beautiful than ever, he realized. She was much more a woman, her figure more filled out, maybe even a little taller. He almost wished Dominic had not brought her, but it was good to see her at that. Her dark skin glowed against the white silk blouse she wore, beneath a suede vest. Her matching suede riding skirt fit her waist and slender hips fetchingly. Her eyes were wide with curiosity and concern, her nearly black hair was pulled back at the sides with combs, and she wore a wide-brimmed suede hat.
“Sometimes a tree doesn’t fall just like it should,” he told her. “Other trees get in the way, changing its direction and causing it to twist, or come back and move across its own trunk. Sometimes it springs up, whacking the faller if he doesn’t make it down from his perch in time. The fallers have to make their way up a trunk by use of platforms or springboards, because we can’t cut a tree right at the base. It’s too brittle and fibrous there. So when it starts to come down, the fallers have to get out of the way. Sometimes they don’t make it.”
Santana frowned. “Do you ever do that yourself?”
He shrugged. “I figure I can’t teach other men to do it if I don’t learn it too. Back east we never had to climb up trees like that, although stump walking can happen with any tree. We’ve had our share of accidents back in Maine, but my father and brother and I have been lucky. A few minor accidents. My brother broke his arm once, and I got a deep cut in one leg from falling with a hatchet in my hand.”
Will looked up at the steep hills that surrounded them and sighed. “Still, logging out here is a completely different thing. I’ve never seen trees that take two men a whole week to cut down. Some are up there so high in the hills that it’s too much of a climb for the oxen, and too steep a pitch coming back down with tons of logs behind them that could overtake them and kill them. I’m working on ways to get them out of there, maybe by building more chutes and flumes.”
“What are those?” Santana asked, excitement showing in her eyes.
Will could see that she liked all of this. Some women were so refined and pampered, they would not even want to come to a place like this—noisy, dangerous, dirty. But Santana seemed interested, eager to learn. “Let’s go inside and look at the band saw,” he said, yelling as the saw began cutting again. He took hold of her arm and led her inside the mill, standing her against a wall so she could watch one of the huge band saws slice through a gigantic log.
Santana stared in wonder as the gigantic saw vibrated up and down by massive pulleys run by a deafening steam engine. The blade screamed when it met the wood, and steam poured from it as a man sitting on a scaffold above poured water over the blade to keep it cooled.
“That track the log is attached to is called a head rig, or log carrier,” Will shouted. “It moves back and forth by steam power. That man riding the log is called a dogger. Each time the log shoots back after a cut, he has to operate the dogs, the big claws that hold the log in place. They have to be reset after each couple of cuts to keep pushing the log over for a new setti
ng until the entire log is sliced up. That man’s job is damn dangerous.”
Santana’s heart caught in her throat as she watched the dogger. He sat atop the log, clinging to it as it shot back and forth on the head rig. He was sweaty, his hair plastered to his head, and he looked weary, yet also strangely exhilarated. “A man must have to like his work very much to be willing to do that,” she yelled back at Will.
Will grinned, then led her back outside. “You’re right about these man having to like what they do,” he said as she brushed sawdust from her skirt. “They’re a rough bunch, let me tell you, but that’s the only kind you can get up here for this, most of them with no families and no responsibilities, men who like to live dangerously and are proud of it.”
“It cannot be easy to keep such men in line,” Dominic said.
Will brushed more dust from his hair himself. “I pay them well and feed them well, brought a couple of good cooks here from San Francisco. I’ve had to knock a couple of the men into line, fire a few, hire more. I’m working on building the best crew I can. Of course, with accidents constantly happening, I’m always having to replace someone. My friend Derek, who I met coming here on the ship from Maine, has become my official personnel man. He’s in San Francisco or some other town more than he’s here, always looking for men who need work. There seem to be plenty of them—men who came out here to get rich and found it wasn’t so easy after all. But they like California so much they don’t want to leave, so they’ll jump at anything to earn a living.”
Santana watched Will as he spoke, admiring his intelligence, his ability to handle such rough men and keep them in line. Will Lassater was sure of himself, but was not arrogant, like Hugo. Yes, he was probably rich and would become much richer, but he earned his way by hard work, not by hiring other men to do everything for him, as Hugo did. He could easily hire an overseer for the mill and sit back in San Francisco and rake in the money, but he was not that kind of man. Something told her that no matter how successful Will was, he would always be right there, working among his men, keeping an eye on everything that was going on.
She was still staring at him when he turned to look at her again, and something in his blue eyes told her he saw her as more than a child now.
“Back to your earlier question,” he said. “Chutes are just what the word sounds like, rounded beds made of wood that are built down a steep mountain and used to shoot logs down to a mill pond. Logs from higher up sometimes travel up to ninety miles an hour coming down a chute, or so I’m told by Noel. I’m going to build my own chute next year higher up in these mountains. It’s safer to use than letting oxen try to haul that much weight down a steep bank.
“Flumes are like chutes, only they’re water fed. You cut the logs into boards first, then you float them down a flume. That’s what we’re doing here. Most of those boards we’re cutting will be sent down a series of flumes to my finishing mill on the coast, where the finished lumber is stacked and stored. It’ll be loaded onto ships that soon will come once every two weeks with orders from lumberyards in San Francisco.” He looked at Dominic. “Eventually I intend to have my own lumberyard there, maybe even my own ships, so the whole thing, from cutting the trees to delivering finished lumber, will belong to Lassater Mills. That’s where you make your best money, keeping your hands on every step of the project.”
Will led Dominic and Santana away from the noisy mill and toward the larger log building Santana had noticed earlier. He kept hold of her arm, and her heart fluttered to think he was being so protective of her as she stepped gingerly over pieces of wood and around mud puddles. A fresh rain the night before had left the ground soft, and she had to lift her skirts with her free hand to avoid the worst mud.
“Hugo must be excited that you are finally in almost full operation,” Dominic said. “He will no doubt find plenty of business for you and buy some of the lumber himself for resale.”
Will stopped walking and faced Dominic, then glanced at Santana with a somewhat guilty look in his eyes. “I won’t be dealing with Hugo,” he said.
Dominic’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “But why? It is Hugo who led you to me. He is my friend, and soon to be my son-in-law.”
“I know what Hugo is to you, Dominic, but I have to tell you I don’t like the man, nor do I trust him. I never made him any promises. He was willing to introduce me to you, so I took him up on it.”
“But you led me to believe…”
“I never meant to lead you to believe anything more than the fact that I wanted to log your trees. I have dealt honestly and fairly with you, and I will continue to do so. I simply told Hugo when I saw him in San Francisco last month that I prefer not to have a middle man. I do all my own dealing and find my own customers. He wasn’t too upset, considering he figures to get a piece of the pie anyway when he marries Santana.”
Santana caught a hint of bitterness in his voice. So, he had thought about her over the months, and he still did not think it was right that she should marry Hugo. Had he said something to Hugo about it? Had they argued? Oh, what a brave man he was, to stand up against someone like Hugo. Hugo had many friends in San Francisco, men who could possibly put Will Lassater out of business before he even got started, but that did not worry Will!
“I hope you aren’t too upset, Dominic,” Will went on. “I mean no insult to you, but I prefer to do my own business dealing, and there’s something about Hugo Bolivar that just rubs me the wrong way.”
Dominic looked angry at first, frowning as he rubbed his chin. His anger faded to concern as he said, “I understand a man who wishes to handle his own affairs, and I know that Hugo can be a bit arrogant and overpowering, but his father was my very good friend. He saved my life, and my wife’s family’s lives, from the hands of death in Mexico, and for this I must always respect his son.”
“I understand,” Will said. “But I have no ties to the man and don’t care to create any. It’s you I’m contracted with, and you’ll get your fair share when I start filling orders and figuring my profits. I won’t cheat you, Dominic.”
Their eyes held, and Dominic nodded. “Of this I have no doubt. You have very honest eyes, Will Lassater, and I can see the quality of man that you are. I could be angry, but I cannot forget that you risked your life to save my daughter once.”
Perhaps I will have to risk it again, to save her from Hugo Bolivar’s clutches, Will thought. He had an idea how to prevent the marriage, though he told himself he was crazy. He had pushed Santana and thoughts of rescuing her from Hugo from his mind for months now. Seeing her again, however, brought it all back, the ache of wanting her for himself. “I’m glad you understand,” he told Dominic, putting out his hand.
Dominic shook it and said, “We will stay the day and a night. I know that Santana has many more questions. I hope you will have time to answer them so that she will not bother me with them once I get her home again.”
Will laughed. “I’ll try. I’ve built my own small cabin not far from here. I’d like you and Santana to sleep there tonight. It’s the best I can do. I’ll bunk with one of the other men. In the meantime, we’ll go over to the cookhouse and see if we can rustle up some tea or coffee. We can talk there, away from all the noise and mud.
“Tonight I want you and Santana to join me there for supper. We’ll eat between crew shifts so that Santana doesn’t have to put up with the crude manners of some of these men. I know you prefer Spanish food, and I guarantee that among the many dishes my cooks put out every night, you’ll find a bit of everything. I have so many different nationalities of men working for me, I have to try to accommodate them all—Americans, Mexicans, Chinese, Indians, several Swedes, a couple of men from England. It makes for some pretty rowdy conversations sometimes, and not a few fistfights over differences in cultures and habits. It’s been quite a challenge whipping these men into well-tuned crews. The Chinese work mostly at cleanup and laundry. Most of them just aren’t built for what has to be done up at the logging site, b
ut I have a few who make good bolt punchers—men who work down at the finishing mill using a pike pole to guide shingle bolts onto a conveyor belt that carries them to the mill to be cut into roofing shingles.”
“You have such strange names for the different jobs these men do,” Santana said. “Doggers, fallers, bolt punchers. What other jobs are there? What different things have to be done between cutting a tree and getting it to the finishing mill?”
“First things first,” Will answered. “I’ll take you to my cabin now so you can unload everything and freshen up. We’ll meet for that cup of tea or coffee in a little while and”—he turned to Santana—“I’ll answer all your questions.”
As he stared into her dark eyes, he was surprised at how happy he was she had come. Should he tell her what had really happened between him and Hugo? That he had bluntly told the man he didn’t think he had any right marrying her? He was already on Hugo Bolivar’s blacklist, and things might get worse. Now that he had seen this beautiful young woman again, he just might have to have the same argument with Dominic…or perhaps do the unthinkable and act on his idea for getting her out of the marriage. It was probably a stupid thought, and he was too damn busy for this, but how could he let it go? There were only three months left.
Was she worth the risk he would be taking? Had the climate here in California, or perhaps a noseful of sawdust, affected his mind? To do what he was considering could mean risking his very life, but when Santana smiled at him the way she was smiling now, he knew he had to try. He had hoped that after all this time it wouldn’t matter to him anymore, but now he knew otherwise. Still, he’d better tell her first and get her reaction. Maybe she had changed her own mind and was now willing to marry Hugo.
“Let’s go get your horses and gear,” he said to her and Dominic. As they walked back to the horses, Will wondered how, once he’d talked to Santana and obtained her permission to do what he had in mind, he was going to tell her father that a gringo wanted to marry his daughter.
The Forever Tree Page 11
