He looked in surprise at the pair before him, and then in a brisk tone demanded to know the meaning of the sight.
Dick drew from his pocket the Ranger badge and explained who he was. He told the Ranger that he was taking LeBlanc, who was wanted for half a dozen or more serious crimes, back to Chester and thence to Hobart to turn him over to the sheriff.
When Dick told of his plan for the night, the Ranger told him that would be unnecessary, for he had a cabin about two miles and a half away.
“You hop up here behind me, and we’ll make the critter with you use Shank’s Mare.”
Dick had now given up all idea of his week in the woods. All he wanted to do was to get LeBlanc in the hands of the law and see how his chums were faring.
At the Ranger’s cabin he found a second waiting, for occasionally the men on the patrol in the Forest Reserve travelled in pairs.
A good hot meal was waiting, and he enjoyed it to the limit. LeBlanc’s hands were loosened sufficiently for him to eat, but with two sizable men and a boy to watch him, he knew it would be futile to attempt to escape.
Dick entertained the Rangers vastly during the meal with his account of how he had subsisted during his stay in the forest.
“I don’t know that I would have gotten along so well,” said one of them, “and I’ve been in this Reserve here for four seasons now.”
The next morning was gloomy and drizzly, and so it was arranged for Dick to make time by riding double with the Ranger, while LeBlanc was tied on a led horse.