“Certainly. I agree with you, Murky.” The mounted policeman took the pencil from the prospector’s hand and drew a straight line near the center of the map. “This line,” he pointed out—Dick thought a little impatiently—“represents a distance of thirty miles. The country is rough, broken, almost inaccessible along its entire length. Somewhere within that thirty miles is a narrow opening, probably not more than fifty, a hundred or two hundred feet wide, which forms one end of what is called Blind Man’s Pass. Now how are you going to find it? There are a thousand different openings, all more or less alike. Attempt to follow any one of them, and you end up against a solid rock wall. You go back and start all over again somewhere else—and with the same result. I spent two weeks out there, going through the same stupid performance day after day. Only infinite patience or fool’s luck will lead you to the right opening.”
So interested had Dick Kent become that presently he crowded closer to the two men and began staring at the paper himself. Exactly what were they trying to do? What were they talking about? Who was McInnes, and why all this bother about a fabled trail through the mountains no one seemed to know anything about? He was interrupted in his train of thought by the next statement of the mounted policeman:
“McInnes had been dead more than a week when I found him. You could see the poor devil had been half-starved and had suffered every sort of hardship and privation. How he had managed to stagger along with that heavy load is more than I can imagine.”
“Too bad ol’ Daddy has passed,” Murky sighed regretfully. “I ’member seeing him one time ’bout three years ago over in the Goose Lake country. Might’ fine ol’ man he was, an’ a good trapper, folks said. Never failed to bring in a good catch ever’ spring—mostly fox, marten an’ beaver—an’ he got top prices ’cause he knew how to cure his fur—all prime, A-Number-1 stuff it was. He had a knack, almost amountin’ to genius for locatin’ black and cross fox an’ then gettin’ ’em to walk plump into his traps.” Nichols paused to gaze reminiscently out of the window and to smile to himself. “Couldn’t beat him that particular way, no, sir. A big catch ever’ year—fortune for most men; yet Daddy allers complained that he wa’n’t gettin’ nothin’ atall, that he was either gonna quit or cross the Dominion Range, where trappin’ was a hull lot better.”
“You’re right about the black fox skins,” remarked Corporal Rand, pushing the paper aside. “In the pack I found beside the body, there were eight of the shiniest, loveliest black pelts I’ve ever looked upon.”
“An’ he came through Blind Man’s Pass,” mused Murky. “The clever ol’ coot. Too bad he didn’t live to tell about it.”
Dick had edged still closer. His eyes were shining with interest. He reached over and touched the sleeve of the corporal’s scarlet tunic.
“Pardon me, Corporal Rand—but I’ve been eavesdropping. You don’t mind, I hope.”
The mounted policeman turned quickly and smiled into the eager face.
“Certainly not, you’re welcome to any information or nonsense you may have heard. Isn’t that the truth, Murky?”