Both Waymart and Sandy regarded the boy intently. "Been back here then, has he?" they asked in one breath.
Ross arose. "’It would be cruelty to little children’ to tell you!" he quoted boldly and opened the door.
Waymart gave an exclamation and sprang to his feet. His hands were clenched. But Sandy, kicking him under the table, guffawed.
"Give and take, Mart," he exclaimed. "I’m willin’ t’ chew my own words, and if I am willin’ there ain’t no kick comin’ from you!"
The following day Ross wrote another letter to Leslie’s father and enclosed the note he had found pinned in his pocket. This letter he entrusted to Wilson to mail in Cody, for Wilson was going to Butte for a few weeks before beginning his winter’s work on his coal claims. He stopped at noon to bid Weimer and Ross good-bye.
"Nothin’ would hire me t’ stay over here all winter," were his last words to Ross.
Although the latter had seen but little of the prospector, his departure made the valley seem lonelier than ever, and caused Ross to cling desperately to the idea of the McKenzies remaining. As the days passed, and more snow fell, the brothers began to get decidedly uneasy. They accounted for their uneasiness to Ross by telling him they were in need of supplies and saw no way of getting any over from Miners’ Camp. Sandy was the informant, as usual, while Waymart’s eyebrows were lifted in momentary surprise. By that time every horse in Miners’ Camp had been sent "below." There was but little grass on the mountains during the brief summer; and through the winter, which occupied nine months of the year, every ounce of fodder must be packed over the difficult road from the ranches.
"I don’t see," quoth Sandy unconvincingly, "but what we’ll have to strike the trail. Hain’t no way, as I can see, to pack grub over except on our backs, and that’s too slow."
For a moment there was silence in Weimer’s cabin. The wind moaned and wailed among the hemlocks, and whistled savagely past the cabin. In his bunk Weimer snored. Above them came the cry of the coyotes, like a child’s long-drawn scream of pain and fear. The terror of loneliness among those overhanging mountains gripped at the boy’s throat. For a moment he could not speak.
Then, "If you could get provisions over easily, would you stay longer?"