“MacDonald, I’ll agree to help you round up Lupo and his gang,” said Mr. Hampton.
They were all sitting in conference, so to speak, about the camp fire, over which Dick was busy broiling fish which he and Art and the boys had just pulled out of the lake. The appetizing odor made the nostrils of the three hungry boys twitch with anticipatory delight.
“Fine,” said the big ranger, “that’s the way I like to hear you talk.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Hampton, meditatively, “I’ve got a very good reason why we should cast in our lot and help you, even supposing Lupo flees and draws us off our course.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, it’s an easy enough one to guess. Lupo evidently is after us. That means that he is being paid by somebody to do us in, or at least thwart us in our search. I want to know who that somebody is. And the only way to find out is to make Lupo prisoner and question him. Moreover, it is possible we may be able to learn something about the mysterious fate of Thorwaldsson and his expedition.”
Farnum had been listening closely. He nodded with satisfaction.
“Just what I was thinking myself.”
“You’re right, Mr. Hampton,” said MacDonald. “But such being the case, we’ll have to be mighty careful that Lupo doesn’t get shot, as then your prospective source of information would vanish.”
“True enough, MacDonald,” said Mr. Hampton. “We’ll all have to be on guard against that misfortune, for misfortune it would be.”