For Wilkinson and his men these were anxious days. They covered the section between the mill and Squamish twice a day; scanning the hillsides and valleys, ever watchful, ever on the alert; pleading and exhorting the settlers and loggers to greater vigilance, and all the while praying fervently for rain.
Donald had posted a notice that any employee found smoking in the woods would be immediately dismissed. Logging creates a vast amount of débris, or “slash,” as it is known to the men of the woods. With the assistance of the Forestry men, Donald’s crew had piled enormous heaps of slash on the hillside, awaiting a favourable opportunity to burn. These menacing piles of brush, extending along the main road for a quarter of a mile, were a constant source of danger. Every precaution, therefore, was taken. The spaces between the mounds of brush were raked clean, the road was patrolled day and night, and pails filled with water were placed at regular intervals. Special notices stating the great danger of fire, and warning not to smoke in this area, were posted conspicuously on tree and stump.
The mill at Cheakamus had closed. Sparks from the donkey engines had threatened the extinction of both plant and timber.
Donald with Wilkinson stood surveying the piles of dangerous waste. “If a fire starts and we can get to it at once, we will be all O.K.” said Wilkinson, “but if it ever gets away from us here,” pointing down the road, “no human agency can stop it.”
They made the rounds of the patrol to satisfy themselves that the watchmen were attending to their duties. Leaving the main road, they scrambled through the tangled masses of tree-tops to ascertain how far distant the slash had been removed from the standing timber. Suddenly a tiny wisp of smoke was seen to drift from behind a fir tree at the edge of the clearing. Without comment, both men broke into a run.
Aroused by the crashing footsteps, a young man, who had been lying stretched lazily on the soft moss, came quickly to his feet, a cigarette held in his fingers. His companion, also smoking, lay with his back against the bole of a tree a few feet distant. Fishing-rods, creeks, landing-nets and the remains of a lunch lay scattered on the ground.