“Oh! yes. I know,” replied Frank, as though really getting quite tired of hearing about that wonderful knife; “some girl you knew in Old Kentucky, wanting to give you a present that you could use out in the wild and woolly West, drew all her pin money she had saved, and actually bought you that fine hunting knife. Too bad that if it was so valuable you didn’t keep a closer watch on it, Bob.”
“But you said you didn’t have it, didn’t you, Frank?” went on the other.
“Sure I haven’t; take my word for that, Bob,” said Frank. “Don’t you think I’d give it to you, if I had it around? Though, for that matter, I think you deserve to be punished a little for being so careless about a present that a girl gave you.”
“But perhaps you could give me a hint about what I did with it, if you cared to, Frank?”
“No, I don’t believe I could,” replied the other, slowly, and in what Bob chose to consider a suspicious way. “You’ll remember after a little. Perhaps it’ll pop into your mind as you wake up in the morning. I’ve had things do that more’n a few times. But look at that steer cavorting around over yonder. Whatever in the world do you suppose he’s doing, Bob?”
The Kentucky boy shook his head as though still unsatisfied.
“I reckon now, Frank might know a little about that knife,” he murmured to himself, as he looked at his chum. “But for some reason he wants to play innocent and let me think things out. And it isn’t like Frank, to act this way. Perhaps I’d best keep quiet, and watch him. He might give himself away somehow when he isn’t on his guard.”
Frank, meanwhile, seemed to be really interested in the actions of the animal to which he had called the attention of his chum.
“Say, suppose we turn aside here,” he remarked, presently; “and go a little closer to that old chap. Looks to me he’s acting mighty queer. See him throw up the dirt; and I can hear him bellow from here. Something’s made him ugly.”
“All right; anything you say goes, Frank,” replied the other, suiting his actions to his words, and wheeling to the left.