“Did you see the giant?” asked several of the men, in concert.
“No, I didn’t see the giant; but I know what it is that makes that noise we hear so regularly,” replied Bob. “It is the echo, awakened by the eruptions of the biggest hot spring I ever saw or heard of. But, before I tell my story, I want to ask you a question. Didn’t you say something about a crazy fellow this morning?”
“I should say so!” exclaimed the wagon-master. “Me an’ the boys was drivin’ along the road, thinkin’ of nothing, when, all to onct, a chap, with ragged clothes an’ streamin’ hair, come rushin’ out of the willows. He tuk just one look at us, an’ then he streaked it acrost the plains, as if all the wolves of Arizony was clost to his heels. In course we didn’t know who he was, but we seed in a minute what was the matter of him. Some of the boys who think themselves jist a trifle swifter nor lightnin’, tuk arter him on foot, but they might jist as well have tried to catch the wind. The feller run like a deer. Then four of us tuk a mule apiece outen the harness, an’ lit out arter him, and finally Jaspar thar tripped him up with a lariat. But he fit like a tiger, an’ it tuk all four of us to hold him.”
“Where is he now?” inquired Bob.
“In that wagon, fast asleep.”
“You don’t think that anything serious will come of it, do you?”
“That’s hard to tell. While I was post-hunter at Camp Clark, I was sent out with a party to look for a soldier who had got lost. When we found him he tuk to a tree, an’ it was all we could do to git him down ag’in. We tuk him to the post, but he must have left some of his brains somewhar in the mesquite bushes; leastwise, he never had a level head on his shoulders arterward, an’ he was discharged from the service fur disability. But we’ll do the best we know how fur this friend of your’n, an’ if anybody kin bring him around all right, I reckon Mr. Evans is the man. Now, Bob, fire away!”
There was no need that the boy should indulge in flights of fancy in order to make his auditors understand that he and George Edwards had had an exceedingly hard time of it, but he could not help growing eloquent when he told of their voyage through the dark canyon and described the geyser and its eruptions.
“I marked every ravine we passed through,” said he, in conclusion, “and some day I am going to take an exploring party back there. But first I am going to make the country about here warm for somebody. By-the-way, I brought a piece of an oar down the hill with me. Have any of you seen it?”
“We tuk keer on it,” said the wagon-master, while all his companions scowled and looked very savage indeed. “Do you know who sawed that thar oar? It was Sam. He done it kase you wouldn’t give him a job, an’ your cousin knowed he was goin’ to do it, an’ he never said a word.”