XXVIII
DODGING THE LOOKOUT
Perk looked eagerly at his old pal when Sergeant Red made that interesting disclosure. The three of them were sitting close to the spring at the time, engaged in passing a collapsible metal cup from hand to hand, and quenching their thirst from the clear water that came forth in apparently inexhaustible quantities.
“Huh! I kinder guessed now, Red, ol’ hoss, that you had a trump cyard up your sleeve all this while—reckon I ain’t forgot a trick you used to play on us boys long ago, springin’ a nice little surprise just when the game looked the bunk, an’ we reckoned we was up a stump. Hit it up then, an’ tell us what sorter good luck it was you run smack up against, that’s got somethin’ to do with this here racket o’ ourn.”
“I was riding slowly back to the station, after taking our mail to the nearest settlement, where it could go on its way by a carrier, when I chanced to hear what sounded like a groan. Of course I first of all suspected it might be some sort of slick trap to get me off my mount; but after riding on a bit I dismounted and fastening my hoss, crept back.
“Turned out to be no fizzle after all, for I found a miserable looking man lying on the ground, half starved, badly wounded in an arm, and looking like he’d been in the river that was close by.
“I reckoned he might be one of the crowd that worked with the Hawk—had an idea I’d seen him before in bad company; but he was a tough looking sight, and I just felt sorry for the bloke. So I fed him, and looked after his hurts, what with a heap of bruises, and a bullet through the fleshy part of his left arm.
“Then I got him on my mount, and carried him all the way to the station. The colonel took charge, and had him put to bed, with Doc. Hamilton looking after his troubles. He got better right away, and on the third day said he must be going. Then he confessed he had been a member of that Hawk gang and that his name was Gene Hotchkiss, though we both reckoned it was one he’d tacked on when he came up here to keep out of jail.
“He went on to tell us that he’d been fool enough to defy the Hawk when full of hard stuff; and how the other had flashed a gun to shoot him through the shoulder; then knocked him down, kicked him in a passion; and finally, when he was mighty near senseless, ordered two of his men to pick him up and throw him over a cliff into the river.
“How he managed to keep from being drowned when so weak and sore he couldn’t explain—all he remembered was managing to pull himself out of the water when an eddy drew him in close to a shelving rock. Later on he tried to make his way along in the direction of Frazer’s post, meaning to get out of this country, for his life would not be worth a pinch of salt if ever the Hawk learned he hadn’t been put out of the way.
“He claimed to have a brother down in Winnipeg, and swore black and blue he was going back to him, so as to try and redeem himself. Colonel Astor encouraged him, feeling that what he spoke was the truth. Well, before he pulled out, going in company with a trapper chancing along right then, the chap was so grateful for all we’d done for him he up and told us a few things about the Hawk, such as we’d been crazy to learn for seven coons’ ages.