STEALING AN AEROPLANE.
After a long time Jimmie had his bear steak, potatoes and coffee set before the men whom he believed to be the burglars who had been chased across the continent. The two sat down and ate with an appetite, while the boys were not at all slow in consuming large sections of bear.
“This is a queer world, ain’t it?” laughed Kit after disposing of a large steak. “Mighty queer world, ain’t it!”
“What’s the Solomon, now?” asked Jimmie, while Phillips and Mendosa looked up interestedly.
“Well,” the boy answered, “not so very long ago this bear was sitting under a Sycamore tree thinking what a nice boy steak he was going to have for dinner. Now, I’m sitting out here by a cosy little fire thinking what a nice bear steak I’ve just had for dinner.”
“I don’t think the bear had much of a chance of getting his boy dinner,” Phillips suggested. “Your friends would have rescued you in a short time if I had not put in my appearance.”
“Anyhow,” Kit went on, with boyish gravity, notwithstanding the twinkle in his eyes, “the bear and I have buried all hard feelings. At least I’ve buried about two pounds of it right now.”
During the remainder of the afternoon the two guests devoted most of their time to talking to each other in low asides, and to asking questions of the two boys. They wanted to know exactly what the aviator had said regarding the chief ranger, and especially what had been said concerning a stay of two or three days farther south.
It was very plain to Jimmie that the outlaws had not as yet been communicated with by either one of the two desperadoes sent on from New York. In fact, the pursuers seemed to have had uncommonly hard luck.
The one referred to by the boys as the monkey-faced man, the one who had chased Jimmie up New York bay, had smashed his machine and broken his arm, so he was entirely out of the race before reaching the Rocky Mountains.