But, to Joe’s disappointment, the Indian shook his head.
“I did meet no white man who is as the weasel and whom the owl and the two young hares pursue,” he rejoined; “neither, till I met you, have I met any man, either white or Indian, since I left Blue Hare Lake.”
“You do not come from the way of the setting sun, then?” For the trail of the fleeing thief had so far led west.
Another negative sign was the reply as the Indian said:
“We come from the north. But some half day’s journey back I crossed a trail which was even as the trail you now follow.”
“I am sorry,” said old Joe. “The weasel must travel as the wind.”
“It may well be even so,” rejoined the Indian. “But hasten, my brother, if you would still follow the trail, for the snows are awakening and the wind stirs in its sleep.”
They bade the Indian and his two silent women “Good day,” and pushed on. Now there was good reason for haste. Indians are rarely or never mistaken in their weather prophecies, and if the snow came before the pursuers had caught up with the thief, they stood a fair chance of losing him altogether, for the snow would infallibly blot out his trail.
That night they came to a small trading post kept by a tall, gangling American, by name Ephraim Dodge. He had a thin, hatchet face and a bobbing goatee, and on either side of his prominent bridged nose twinkled a shrewd, although kind, eye.
Yes, Ephraim had seen the man they were pursuing and “allowed he was pretty badly tuckered out.” He had stopped at his post and purchased some canned goods and oatmeal. Then he had pressed straight on. No, he had not offered any skins for sale, and, according to Ephraim, was an “ornery-lookin’ cuss, anyhow.”