Besides, Jack felt constrained to keep himself in touch with a retreating line of brush, in order to make a quick getaway should any alarming sound, like the fall of a dislodged rock, give warning of the possible approach of some curious investigator.
By degrees he familiarized himself with every part of the depressed ground falling under the scope of his glasses. In so doing he paid a great deal of attention to the long, low log cabin, which he had in the beginning decided must be a dining hall, and general loafing quarters.
Men came and went, and several of those who reappeared, after a protracted stay within, seemed to be wiping their mouths, as though they had been eating. Then it was finally decided without the least doubt, when a man wearing an apron that may have once been white, and a similar peakless cap, evidently serving as a general cook, came out and emptied some left-overs into a wooden pail, so it could be carried away, to be devoured by buzzards, or possibly skulking foxes and coyotes, perhaps even timber wolves.
CHAPTER XXIII
Perk Carries on
Apparently Jack found considerable interest in the man wearing the white cap of a cook, for he watched him keenly as he came and went, limping a little, it seemed, as though somewhat lame.
Then, as the morning drew on, Jack changed his location, as though desirous of applying his energies to another duty that claimed attention. He was away from his post all of three hours; and when once more creeping over to the friendly screen of scrub bushes, there was a satisfied look on his grim face, that gave him an air of renewed confidence.
Apparently things were working along the right path, which would mean he found them to his liking.
If Jack felt exceedingly hungry, with so little to stay the clamorings of an empty stomach, he gave no evidence of such a thing. But then he did not happen to belong to the class of “squealers,” as honest Perk often delighted to assign himself, without a blush of shame—he was built to expect three square meals per diem, and felt he had a right to “kick” when, through some misfortune they failed to come along on schedule.
The afternoon wore away slowly, with Jack in continual use of his glasses. It was a most interesting study for him, this spying upon the hideout of the greatest aggregation of badly wanted refugees from the Law he had ever run across.
What a grand haul would result if only he chanced to have a dozen of his fellow workers in the Secret Service at his call, ready to draw a net around the sunken valley, and forcing a general surrender. A good many empty cells in the Federal penitentiaries would be filled with their former occupants, Jack was telling himself, as he strove to count the idle members of the gang sunning themselves, and taking things so comfortably, as though they refused to entertain a single minute of fear concerning the possibility of the army being used by Uncle Sam to encompass their downfall.