“Good,” declared Toma.
“I like it very much,” smiled Dick. “It ought to throw Brennan and McCallum completely off our trail. They’ll be waiting for us somewhere a short distance up the river and, when we fail to put in an appearance either by raft or on foot, they won’t know what has become of us. I doubt if they’ll ever tumble to the fact that we’ve gone over to the Clear Spring River. When they do come back here to investigate and stumble upon our trail, we’ll be so far away they won’t be able to overtake us.”
While Dick had been talking, Toma paced restlessly back and forth near the campfire. For some unexplainable reason, he felt uneasy. For several minutes now, he had been watching closely a thicket of elders as a cat might watch a mouse. On two different occasions the leaves and branches of the elders had stirred gently. A light breeze flowed down along the river valley, yet it was so vagrant and listless that it scarcely could be felt fanning one’s cheek. Yet he had distinctly seen the elders moving. His quick eye had noted this and his first thought had been that possibly a squirrel was playing there. Catching up his rifle, he strode straight over to the clustered thicket and parted the branches. As he peered within, for one fleeting moment he was under the impression that he had caught sight of something brown. Then he heard a stealthy movement, followed, by the unmistakable crackling of dry branches.
Pushing his way within the thicket, he paused to listen. He could hear no further sound. Yet something told him that that fleeting glimpse of something brown had not been of an animal but of a man—Wolf Brennan or McCallum!
He took a few steps forward, critically examining the ground. A barely audible sound escaped his lips. He stooped quickly over the faint imprint of a moccasined foot. Satisfied, his suspicions confirmed, he dashed on through the thicket, emerging at its farther side, just as two figures topped a low hill not thirty feet ahead. Toma raised his rifle to his shoulder in a lightning motion, then came a blinding explosion and the two men ducked their heads as a bullet whistled between them.
The skulkers did not hesitate for even a fraction of a second. They dashed down the hill toward the thicker growth just below. Just as they entered this welcome barrier, a second bullet clipped the leaves above their heads.
In the wild scramble that followed, Wolf Brennan lost his hat. Cursing, he started back for it when still another lead pellet whizzed past, so close to his face that he thought better of it, turned and plunged on after his companion.
Soon afterward, Toma strode back into camp as calmly as if nothing happened. His expression was reserved and dignified. Except for a faint sparkle in his eyes, one could never have guessed that only a short time before he had been so busy.
“What were you shooting at?” Dick and Sandy demanded.
The young Indian smiled faintly.