Clay knew that there was always a chance that Durand, pursued by the Mexicans, might make for the motor boat, not knowing the conditions existing on board. Still, it was so remote a chance that he smiled as he considered it. But something had to be done.
Captain Joe’s return, his attitude, told of trouble ashore. If all had been well with the boys, one or all of them would have accompanied the dog to the motor boat. Clay decided to take the one chance there was of losing the Rambler—the only chance there was if King was what he professed to be. The boys demanded his whole attention.
“There’s only one thing I want to say to you,” King said, as Clay lowered himself over the rail. “If you find this Durand boy with the others, just bring him along with you, and say nothing about my being on board. If you get him here, you shall share the reward.”
Clay made no promise. He was more than disgusted at the course events were taking. Instead of sailing, care-free, up the river, as had been planned, his chums were in some trouble of which he knew nothing on shore, and he was leaving the Rambler in the charge of an entire stranger.
Besides, on their very first day on the Colorado, they had become entangled in the meshes of a crime committed in Chicago more than a month before, and the boy had had enough of crime on his previous river trips!
Just now, his chief aim was to get entirely away from civilization. He wanted to get his friends together once more, get rid of King and all that he represented, and proceed to the wonderful sights to be found on the river. He wanted to lose sight of everything save the original purpose of the trip. He had had enough of mixing with others’ affairs!
He gained the shore without getting more than his feet wet and crossed the tide-washed stretch of sand to the natural levee. Looking back, he saw King tinkering with the motors, and was seriously inclined to return to the Rambler. But Captain Joe was urging him on with all the arguments known to a white bulldog, so he crossed the string of sandy barrier and set out for the spur which ran down from the foothills.
There was no one in sight, either up or down the river, and his idea was that the Mexicans had deserted the position opposite the old anchorage. Either that, or they were in hiding ahead, waiting to seize him.
Finally Captain Joe deserted him, wandered off unobserved into one of the wrinkles in the hills. He could not understand this at all, for the dog should have continued to lead the way to the source of trouble he had returned to the Rambler to report.
For a moment Clay considered the advisability of returning at once to the motor boat. The sun shone out of the sky like a blazing ball of fire, and the sands were hot and blinding. As far as he could see, up and down the river, there were no evidences of human life in sight save only the Rambler, lying on a stream which seemed to Clay to have a right to boil with the heat which surrounded it.