“He isn’t crazy, Sledge Hammer,” declared Jim Nestor, in a whisper, for he knew what his foreman thought. “He jest collects bugs, that’s all,” and, while Professor Snodgrass moved off to one side, to look for more jumping flies, the boys explained the fad of their friend.
“But you started to say something about a Mr. Jackson,” remarked Jim Nestor, to Jerry.
“Not Mr. Jackson, but Jackson Bell, the old hermit,” was the answer, and Jerry proceeded to explain as much of the mystery as he knew; how he believed that Mr. Bell had come East to get aid in rescuing some of his friends from a mysterious valley, how he had been deceived by Noddy, taken in the airship, and how he disappeared, leaving the fragments of a letter behind him.
“I wish we could find him,” went on Jerry, “and aid his friends. But, after thinkin’ it all over, I am sometimes inclined to believe that Mr. Bell’s mind may have become weakened, and that he imagined all that about his friends being in danger in some valley.”
“Very likely,” assented Nestor. “I guess there’s not much stock to be taken in it.”
“Yes, there is!” suddenly exclaimed the old miner.
“Is what?” asked Nestor.
“Stock to be taken in that story,” answered Tod. “I don’t know this Mr. Jackson Bell, but I do happen to know that somewhere in the Rocky Mountains is a mysterious valley, where there is supposed to be a party of whites—men, women and children—who have been lost for years.”
“You know something like that, and never told me?” asked Nestor, somewhat reproachfully.
“Well, you never asked me,” went on Tod, “and, for that matter, the story is an old one.”