Then he turned as Charnock came up.
"Which is it--logs or stones ?" the latter asked.
"Logs, I think; we can handle them easily," Festing replied.

"The other job is urgent, but the thaw has only begun, and when the ground gets properly soft we'll do twice as much as we could now.

Still, there's a risk.

We could make some progress with the track, and the warm spell mayn't last." "Take the risk," said Charnock with a laugh.

"There's not much fun in playing for safety, and you don't get far that way, while when you try to foresee things you generally see them wrong.