“Thar! I’ve got it! We’ll fool the imps yit, by ge-mineezers! That is, we will ef we do; an’ ef we don’t, why, we will, anyhow. No use talkin’—we must do it,” and the guide uttered a deep sigh of relief, as he glanced, first at one, then at the other, of his companions.
“Do what? What do you mean, Tom?”
“Lis’en. I said we’d fool them imps, an’ I b’lieve we kin do it. I don’t say we kin, fer shore, but I think so. A feller mustn’t—”
“But your plan—what is it?” impatiently interrupted Calhoun. “There is no time to lose.”
“Thar’s another day a-comin’, boss,” coolly added Maxwell, his tones telling that his mind was still busied with the details of his plan. “No need to be in a hurry. Know’d a feller to die, onc’t, ’cause he was in too big a hurry. Got lost thar—starved to death afore he could find his way out. Thar, it’s did—now listen.
“Fust, we’re here—they’re thar, an’ somebody else is in t’other place. We must find that t’other somebody. See?” hastily spluttered Maxwell.
“But how?”
“You ’member the train we left at Dutchman’s Crick—the sojer one? It couldn’t travel much faster ’n we did, so it must be not very fur away now, on t’other trail. We must get word to them. Now fer the how.
“One o’ us—a volunteer ef thar is one—ef not, I’ll try it—must drop over thar in the drink, an’ swim down ontel he kin git out ’thout the reds seein’ him. Then he must putt out, hot fut, an’ not stop fer nothin’ ontel he strikes t’other trail Then ef the big train hes goed by, he must ketch up ’th it. Ef not, then he must go t’other way ontel he finds it. That did, he’ll tell o’ our sitivation an’ bring help—twenty sojers ’ll do, ’th what we hev here. See?”
“But can the trail be found, Tom? Won’t whoever attempts it, get lost?”