“Did Bell know anything about our being out here?” asked Strubell, turning to the trapper.
“He ‘spected you three, but he didn’t know nothin’ ‘bout me, and didn’t know when you would show yourselves. He s’posed I would meet you and give you the news, and you would hurry along. He knowed you war aimin’ for the old mission buildin’ and would be along after a while if the varmints didn’t cut you off.”
“What about our pack animals?”
“He spoke of ‘em, and said Jim-John and Brindage would ‘tend to ‘em.”
“You did so well in arranging the ransom that you ought to have included them.”
“I could have done it if you had said so, but I follered orders,” replied the trapper.
“Well,” said Lattin, “the question now is what we are to do; if Nick only knowed where we are it would be simple enough; he could give the Apaches the slip and hang ‘round till mornin’, when we could come together.”
“But it looks as if he will ride till daylight as hard as his pony can stand it—that is, if the redskins haven’t got him,” observed Strubell, “and we may hunt over the whole of New Mexico and Arizona without finding him.”
“It don’t seem to me that it will be as bad as that,” remarked Herbert, eager to gather every crumb of comfort; “for he must know he can’t find us by riding westward, but will start eastward after escaping the Apaches, so as to meet us on the way.”