Scott was disposed to make light of the lucky chance, as he termed it, that had thrown the two men into his way. Hawk, on the other hand, declared in his arbitrary manner that it was not wholly a lucky chance. He understood the Indian’s dogged tenacity too well to think for a moment that the fugitives could have escaped him, even had he not ridden into Casement’s camp as he so fortuitously had done.
The scout, Hawk knew, had the characteristic intuition of the frontiersman; the mental attributes that combine with keen observation and unusually good judgment as aids to success when circumstances are seemingly hopeless. Such men may be at fault in details, and frequently are, but 242 they are not often wholly wrong in conclusions. And in their pursuit of a criminal they are like trained hounds, which may frequently lose their trail for a moment, but, before they have gone very far astray, come unerringly back to it.
“If they ever give you a chance, Bob, you will make a great thief-catcher,” exclaimed Hawk with his naturally prodigal generosity of appreciation.
“I certainly never expected to catch Rebstock and this fellow Seagrue as easily as that,” smiled Scott, as the troopers took charge of his men.
“If you hadn’t caught them there you would have trailed them there. It would only have meant a longer chase.”
“A whole lot longer.”
“When you come to think of it, Bob, the railroad was their only hope, anyway. They did right in striking for it. Without horses, the big camp and the trains for Medicine Bend every day were their one chance to get away.”
Scott assented. “The trouble with us,” he smiled, “was that we didn’t think until after it was all over. Sometime a man will come to 243 these mountains who thinks things out before they happen instead of after. Then we will have a man fit to run the secret service on this railroad. But we are losing time,” he added, tightening up his saddle girths.
“What are you going to do now? And why,” demanded Hawk without waiting for an answer, “did you drag these men away down here instead of leaving them for Casement to lock up until we were ready to take them to Medicine Bend?”
“I am going to drag them farther yet,” announced Scott. “I am going to ride after the French trader and fit these two fellows out in their own clothes again to make it easier for Bucks to indentify them.”