Tranquil fixed a scrutinising glance on the monk's placid face.
"For what purpose did they that?" he asked, with a suspicious accent.
"Ah," Fray Antonio went on, "that I could not comprehend, though I am perhaps beginning to suspect it."
The hearers bent toward the speaker with an expression of impatient curiosity.
"This evening," the monk went on, "the Chief of the Redskins himself accompanied me to within a short distance of your bivouac; on coming in sight of your fire he pointed it out to me, saying, 'Go and sit down at that brasero. You will tell the great Pale hunter that one of his oldest and dearest friends desires to see him.' Then he left me, after making the most horrible threats if I did not obey him at once. You know the rest."
Tranquil and his comrades regarded each other in amazement, but without exchanging a word. There was a rather long silence; but Tranquil at length took on himself to express aloud the thought each had in his heart.
"'Tis a trap," he said.
"Yes," Loyal Heart remarked; "but for what purpose?"
"How do I know?" the Canadian muttered.
"You said, Fray Antonio," the young man continued, addressing the monk, "that you suspected the motives of the Apaches' extraordinary treatment of you?"