"You and Gregson must have been laid up at about the same time," said the young engineer. "That was a painful wound of Gregson's. I wonder who the deuce it was who shot him? Funny that a man like Gregson should have an enemy!"
Thorne sat up with a jerk. There came the rattle of a pan from the stove, and Howland turned his head in time to see Jackpine staring at him as though he had exploded a mine under his feet.
"Who shot him?" gasped the senior engineer. "Why--er--didn't Gregson tell you that it was an accident?"
"Why should he lie, Thorne?"
A faint flush swept into the other's pallid face. For a moment there was a penetrating glare in his eyes as he looked at Howland. Jackpine still stood silent and motionless beside the stove.
"He told me that it was an accident," said Thorne at last.
"Funny," was all that Howland said, turning to the Indian as though the matter was of no importance. "Ah, Jackpine, I'm glad to see the coffee-pot on. I've got a box of the blackest and mildest Porto Ricans you ever laid eyes on in my kit, Thorne, and we'll open 'em up for a good smoke after supper. Hello, why have you got boards nailed over that window?"
For the first time Howland noticed that the thin muslin curtain, which he thought had screened a window, concealed, in place of a window, a carefully fitted barricade of plank. A sudden thrill shot through him as he rose to examine it. With his back toward Thorne he said, half laughing, "Perhaps Gregson was afraid that the fellow who clipped off his finger would get him through the window, eh?"
He pretended not to perceive the effect of his words on the senior engineer. The two sat down to supper and for an hour after they had finished they smoked and talked on the business of the camp. It was ten o'clock when Thorne and Jackpine left the cabin.
No sooner had they gone than Howland closed and barred the door, lighted another cigar, and began pacing rapidly up and down the room. Already there were developments. Gregson had lied to him about his finger. Thorne had lied to him about his own injuries, whatever they were. He was certain of these two things--and of more. The two senior engineers were not leaving the Wekusko because of mere dissatisfaction with the work and country. They were fleeing. And for some reason they were keeping from him the real motive for their flight. Was it possible that they were deliberately sacrificing him in order to save themselves? He could not bring himself to believe this, notwithstanding the evidence against them. Both were men of irreproachable honor. Thorne, especially, was a man of indomitable nerve--a man who would be the last in the world to prove treacherous to a business associate or a friend. He was sure that neither of them knew of Croisset or of the beautiful girl whom he had met at Prince Albert, which led him to believe that there were other characters in the strange plot in which he had become involved besides those whom he had encountered on the Great North Trail. Again he examined the barricaded window and he was more than ever convinced that his chance hit at Thorne had struck true.