“None,” said Charley.

“Then surely you could discuss forest matters in the presence of a ranger.”

“It may be that I am unreasonable,” said Charley, “but I don’t like that man.  There’s something about him that I don’t trust.”

The forester looked at Charley searchingly.  “Sometimes,” he said, “I almost feel that way myself.  I realize that Lumley is mouthy and inquisitive and disagreeable personally, but he has been in the Forest Service a long time and it hardly seems right not to trust him.  He’s a pretty efficient ranger.”

“Well, I’m here, anyway,” continued Charley.  “I came to find out what my first duties are to be and how to do them.”

“There’s a little tree planting that simply must be done in your territory, late though it is,” said Mr. Marlin.  “To-morrow I shall send you out with a small crew to do it.”

“Please show me just how it ought to be done,” said Charley.

The forester smiled with approval.  “Come out-of-doors,” he said, picking up a mattock.  And he led the way to a bed of seedling spruces that had been heeled in the ground, and dug up two or three of them.

“These ought to be lifted in small bunches and their roots puddled,” he said, dipping the earth-covered roots in water to show how to puddle them.  “They should be planted thus.”  He struck his mattock sharply into the soil, bent it to one side, and in the hole thus opened thrust a tiny tree.  Then he stepped on the ground close to the seedling and pressed the earth tight about it.

“That’s all there is to it,” he said.  “Your crew will work in pairs, one man carrying the trees in a pail of water and inserting them in the ground, while the other man carries the mattock and opens the holes.  The trees should be planted in straight rows and about four feet apart each way.  You will have to go ahead of the crew and set up the line pole.  Pick out some trees or saplings to sight by and you will have no trouble to keep your line straight.”

“Is that all?”

“You’ll have to oversee the work, of course.  Make sure the planting is done right, and watch your men.  You will have to take whatever steps seem necessary to keep them working well and cheerfully.  Sometimes it is a good thing to switch a man from one job to another.  It rests him to use another set of muscles.”

“What else am I to do?”

“Day after to-morrow I want you to brush out the fire trails leading to your old camp.  That is, you must start brushing them out.  It will take several days.  They are so overgrown now that they are a real menace to the forest.  These trails were originally five feet wide.  We took out all the roots and underground growths down to mineral soil.  You must cut away all the brush that has grown in, chop it into short lengths, and pile it in little piles in the trail itself for burning on windless days.  You must grub out the roots that have grown in, too.  Really the entire trail ought to be grubbed again, but we can’t do that now.  You will have to assign men to cut brush, to pile it, and to grub up the roots.  That’s about all I can tell you.”