“I hain’t got none,” replied Simon Cool, for it was he. “I didn’t have but one load for the rifle, and I tried to get something to eat with that.”
“When did you last see the boys who own these things?” asked Uncle Dick.
“Two days ago.”
“How many of them were they, and were they all right?”
Simon replied that there were three of them, and that the last time he saw them they were safe and sound, and in no danger of suffering from cold or hunger; and then, in obedience to Uncle Dick’s command, went on to tell his story—the true story this time—to which his auditors listened with much more attention than they had given when he related his first one. He told everything just as we have told it, and when his story was ended, Dick Lewis declared that they had rested long enough, and ordered an immediate start.
The sorrow which Simon Cool pretended to feel for the wrong he had done, did not secure his release, as he had hoped it would. Uncle Dick did not know how much faith to put in him. They might not find the boys where Simon said he had left them; or if they did find them, they might not be all right after all. Then, too, they might have more to tell than Simon had seen fit to disclose; and taking all these things into consideration, Uncle Dick decided that the man should be detained until they had opportunity to satisfy themselves of the truth of his statements.
Frank’s horse, being the largest and strongest animal in the party, was given over to Dick Lewis, who took Simon up behind him and carried him during the rest of the journey. So impatient were they all to find the missing boys, that their halts were few and far between, and they made such good headway, in spite of the snow-drifts, that they reached the mouth of the gully on the afternoon of the second day after the finding of Simon Cool. The gully was filled with snow, and as it had not been recently disturbed, they knew that the boys were still finding shelter under the cliffs.
While Dick and Bob were breaking a road for the horses, the former, whose eyes were everywhere, called Frank’s attention to something. It was a smooth, bare spot on a beech tree, from which the bark had been cleared by a knife or hatchet. Frank became excited at once. He floundered through a deep drift, brushed the snow off the tree, and calling the attention of his companions, read aloud the following, which had been written with a lead-pencil:
“Nov. 12th.—All well and hearty, but don’t like being weather-bound. If we must be snowed up again, should rather have it done in summer. Take the first right-hand gully, then the next right-hand one, and you will find us before you have gone a quarter of a mile.”