"Sure," said Bob. Now that he understood he could follow out on this
strange map the blocks, streets and alleys of that silent, tenantless
city.

"On these tags," pursued Collins, "are figures. These figures show how
much lumber is in each pile, and what kind it is, and of what quality.
In that way we know just what we have and where it is. The sealers
report to us every day just what has been shipped out, and what has been
piled from the mill. From their reports we change the figures on the
tags. I'm going to let you take care of that."

Bob bestowed his long figure at the desk assigned him, and went to work.
He was interested, for it was all new to him. Men were constantly in and
out on all sorts of errands. Fox came to shake hands and wish him well;
he was off on the ten o'clock train. Bob checked over a long invoice of
camp supplies; manipulated the copying press; and, under Collins's
instructions, made out time checks against the next pay day. The
insistence of details kept him at the stretch until noon surprised him.

After dinner and a breath of fresh air, he plunged again into his tasks.
Now he had the scalers' noon reports to transfer to the tally board. He
was intensely interested by the novelty of it all; but even this early
he encountered his old difficulties in the matter of figures. He made no
mistakes, but in order to correlate, remember and transfer correctly he
was forced to an utterly disproportionate intensity of application. To
the tally board he brought more absolute concentration and will-power
than did Collins to all his manifold tasks. So evidently painstaking was
he, that the little bookkeeper glanced at him sharply once or twice.
However, he said nothing.