“Well, then was the time that you oughter jumped out an’ took it away from him,” said Sam. “I’ll bet you the guides found it same’s they did the canoe.”
“Now, jest listen at you! Wasn’t I hid in plain sight of them when they was ferried acrost the outlet at the hatchery, an’ didn’t I take pains to see that they didn’t have no grip-sacks with ’em? If I had took it away from him by force he would have got mad an’ went an’ told on me; don’t you see? I knowed that the only chance I had was to steal the money unbeknownst to Jakey, an’ make him think the guides got it. Looked in every place without findin’ it, did you? Well, there’s one thing about it. If Jakey don’t come up here to-morrer an’ give me them six thousand dollars, I’ll tell on him, an’ he shan’t live in my family no longer. It’s most dark, Sammy, an’ time for me an’ you to be a-lumberin’.”
“Where to?” inquired Sam.
“Why, to Rube’s, in course. We ain’t got no place else to go, have we?”
“But what’s the sense in goin’ there when you know Rube ain’t friendly to you?”
“Me an’ your mam talked it all over, an’ we know jest what we’re goin’ to do,” replied the squatter. “We’ve got to take to the woods now, an’ live like we done before Rube opened his shanty to us. We’re in danger long’s we stay there, an’ this night will be the last one we shall ever spend under his roof. But we’ve got to have some furnitur’ to put into our shanty after we get it built, an’ we’ll try to get it of Rube. I shall make enough outen them guns to buy the furnitur’, an’ then if Jake will come to his senses an’ give me the handlin’ of that money we’ll live like fightin’ fowls; won’t we, Sammy?”
Aloud Sam said he thought they would; but to himself he said it would be a long time before his father would have the handling of that money. He intended to keep every dollar of it, although, for the life of him, he could not make up his mind what he would do with it.
It was dark long before Sam and his father reached the cabin, and the only member of the family they found there was the old woman, Rube being at the hatchery on watch, and Jake having failed to “show up.” That made Matt furious.
“Looks as if he meant to keep outen our way, find that money when he gets a good ready, an’ take himself off,” exclaimed the squatter. “It won’t work, that plan won’t. I ain’t fooled the sheriff an’ all his constables for years an’ years to let myself be beat by one of my own boys at last, I bet you. We’ll stay here to-night, ’cause we ain’t nowhere else to go, an’ to-morrer we’ll buy some bed-furnitur’ an’ cookin’-dishes of Rube, an’ go to hidin’ in the woods agin. If Jakey wants to live with us, he’d best bring them six thousand dollars with him when he comes hum.”
The squatter went to sleep fully expecting to find the missing boy occupying his shake-down when he awoke in the morning; but he was disappointed. His absence alarmed Matt, who began to fear that Jake had fallen into the hands of the constables; but a few cautious questions propounded to Rube, when the latter came to breakfast, set his fears on that score at rest.