Jack had arrayed himself in a suit of new clothing throughout. A beautiful shirt of antelope skin, heavily fringed and ornamented with quills, buckskin trousers, bead worked, and a pair of handsomely ornamented buckskin moccasins, with parfleche soles. About his hat was a strip of otter fur. His knife sheath was a large one of Indian make, studded with bright brass headed nails, and from a buttonhole of his shirt hung the gold powder charger by a buckskin string.
They started late, and it was night when they reached Fort Benton. However, Hugh managed to find his friend who owned the stable, and they put their possessions in it, their horses into the corral, and slept on the fragrant hay. At daylight next morning they were up, and after a time had breakfast. Hugh inquired when the bank would be open, and learned that this would not be for three or four hours yet. He told the boys, therefore, to go out and wander about the town if they wanted to, and said that he would stay with their property in the stable, until the time came to go to the bank with the gold.
Joe's childhood having been spent in Benton, he was a good guide for the town; yet concerning the old fort and the interior of the trading posts, he knew little or nothing. For some time they wandered through the streets and down along the river bank, and at length turned about to return to the stable. As they were passing along the street, Jack stopped before the window of a saloon to look at a mountain sheep's head with immense horns, and after he had looked at it for a while, and spoken with Joe of its great size, he turned to walk away, and as he did so, found himself standing face to face with a very tall man, whose long white beard reached nearly to his waist. The stranger was not only very tall, but very broad as well; but seemed thin, almost to emaciation, yet gave one the idea of a person possessing great strength. He was neatly dressed in buckskin, which, though not new, was clean and in good condition, and was without any ornament of beads or quill work. As Jack stepped aside to avoid the old man, he spoke to him in a low, pleasant voice, and said: "The head is large, my friend, is it not?"
"Yes, sir," said Jack, "it's immense. I never saw anything so big, but then I haven't killed many sheep, in fact, I have only seen a very few."
"You are young," said the stranger. "You have not lived long enough to see many things. Do you belong in this country?"
"No," said Jack, "I come from back in the States. I am just out here for a little while, and have been living this summer with the Indians up north."
"You are along way from home. How do you come to be here?" said the man. "Young boys do not usually travel that great distance alone."
"Oh," said Jack, "I came with a friend, Mr. Hugh Johnson, maybe you've heard of him. He's been a long time in the country, more than forty years." The man seemed to ponder.
"Many years ago I knew a man so called; those were in the trapping days. We used to call him then, Casse-tête, because, once with a stone, he smashed the head of a wounded cow that was charging him. He had a strong arm and good luck." Jack was interested, and wondered if it were Hugh who had done this. He would have liked to ask more questions, but by the clock in the saloon, he saw that it was time to meet Hugh, and he thought, perhaps, that he could find this old man again, later, and talk to him, so he took off his hat politely and said good morning, and started to go on. But as he moved, the old man touched him on the shoulder and said: "Wait, friend; you have there," pointing to Jack's breast, "property that I lost long ago. Where did you get it? If you look at it, you will find scratched in the metal, my initials, 'B. L.'"
For a moment, Jack was almost dumb with astonishment, and then he said: "Are you Baptiste Lajeunesse?"