"What's the matter, Mack?" asked Oscar cheerfully. "Did the concerts to which we listened last night scare all the life out of you?"
"Oh, no, sir!" replied the man, who was bolder now that it was daylight and the lions were gone. "I am going to have rheumatic fever, I am afraid."
"That's bad," said Oscar; but still there was not much sympathy in his tones. He shrewdly suspected that the only thing that troubled his after-rider was an utter lack of courage, and that he was feigning sickness for some purpose of his own. "Hadn't you better take something for it? You know where the medicine-chest is. I suppose you can't go with me to follow up the spoor of that buffalo Big Thompson wounded yesterday?"
"Indeed, I can't," replied McCann in a weak voice. "I couldn't sit in the saddle for half an hour to save my life. It will be no use for you to follow up the spoor, for you will find nothing but bones when you get to the end of it. The lions, hyenas, and jackals have made a meal of him before this time."
"I suppose they have; but we may find some beast which has not yet satisfied his appetite hanging around the carcass, you know," said Oscar as he kneeled on the ground and plunged his head into the water-bucket that served him as a wash-basin.
That was just what McCann was afraid of, and it was one reason why he did not want to go with his employer when the latter left the camp to follow up the spoor; but, of course, he did not say so.
"As soon as the cattle come up put the saddles on Little Gray and Leichtberg, and tell Thompson that I want him to go with me to act as trailer and after-rider," said Oscar, drawing his head out of the bucket long enough to take breath. "Tell him, also, to put ropes and collars on Ralph and Rover. We will take them with us and leave the rest of the pack in camp."
Leichtberg was the name of one of Oscar's new horses, and Ralph and Rover were the two deer-hounds which had been presented to him by Mr. Lawrence.
Oscar had noticed that these high-toned animals would not hunt well when in company with the other members of the pack, and he wanted to see what they could do by themselves.
"I want to get away from here as soon as I can, and consequently I must improve every hour. By this time next week we shall be fifty miles deeper in the wilderness," said Oscar as his head went down into the bucket again.