“Why not?”
“The chances are about five to one that you’ll never be heard from again if you do. You’ll disappear.”
“What?” cried Frank. “Has Dugan such a reputation as that? Why, I should think he’d be taken care of by the officers.”
“It’s never been possible to prove anything against him. One or two government officers, looking for smugglers, have vanished very mysteriously after going up the lake. It is thought that Dugan knows something of what happened to them, but nobody can tell. They’re afraid of him up there, and nobody dares say anything against him. If they know anything, they keep still. Every little while he goes off somewhere, and it’s said he disposes of the stuff that has been smuggled over the line. He’s just returned from one of those trips.”
“Well, Mr. Dugan is turning out to be a far more interesting individual than I imagined he could be when I first saw him,” declared Merry.
“Oh, he’s interesting enough, but he’s dangerous. You’ll be spotted as soon as you go up there. If you take my advice, you’ll let that rifle go.”
“What’s that? Not try to recover my rifle?”
“Better lose a rifle than lose your life.”
“I vowed I’d recover that rifle at any cost when I found it was stolen. I shall not be scared out of making a determined attempt to keep that vow.”