“Here’s Chip, Pink,” said Clancy; “perhaps his eagle eye can pick out a trail up the side of that wall.”
“If it can,” returned Ballard, “Chip’s entitled to a leather medal.”
“Where’s Darrel, fellows?” was Merriwell’s first question when he reached the side of his chums.
“Search me,” answered Clancy, in some surprise. “He was back there on the flat when Pink and I left.”
“Probably he ducked into one of the tents,” said Ballard. “The look Hawtrey gave him, there under the cottonwood, was enough to make almost anybody squirm away and get out of sight. Holy smoke, but that colonel’s a cold-blooded proposition!”
“Darn shame, too, the way he hands it to Darrel,” growled Clancy. “Jode Lenning’s a skunk—any one can see that with half an eye—yet here the old colonel coddles up to Lenning and throws a frost into Darrel every time he gets the chance. Hawtrey must be dippy. What was the chin-chin all about, Chip?”
Merriwell repeated the gist of the colonel’s remarks.
“Listen to that!” exclaimed Clancy. “So he thinks Lenning is a true sportsman, does he? How do you suppose Lenning manages to pull the wool over his eyes?”
“Because he’s slick, and hasn’t any scruples to amount to anything,” said Ballard; “that’s how.”
“I don’t think we ought to have anything to do with Lenning and that bunch of his, Chip,” declared the red-headed boy wrathfully. “Because Lenning has the colonel landed and strung, that’s no sign we should let him repeat the operation with us.”