“It has commenced to look that way,” Dick agreed. “But I think we can account for it. Corporal Richardson and Malemute Slade are keeping them so busy, they haven’t time to come up here to worry us.”
“Still,” Sandy reflected, “I don’t believe Henderson will give up so easily. They know about the mine and will do everything possible to gain control of it. The outlaws will be in a dangerous mood now after losing the fur.”
Toma did not, as a general thing, enter into the discussions Dick and Sandy so often indulged in. But he was an attentive listener at all times, very rarely failing to understand what was being said. In the present instance so interested had he become, that he quite forgot his usual taciturnity.
“What you think, Dick,” he suddenly broke forth, “if I tell you Henderson’s men him close to us all the time since we left post? You believe me crazy fool, eh?”
Dick was so startled by the question that he stopped dead in his tracks and stared curiously at the young Indian.
“Why—why,” he stammered, “I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. But you’re spoofing me, Toma. It isn’t reasonable, of course.”
“I think,” Toma was in deadly earnest, “that Henderson send men to follow us when we left post. Right now, Henderson’s men in hiding close by. You see if Toma not speak you the truth.”
Sandy laughed in derision.
“That’s a good one! If Henderson is within fifty miles of us right now, I’ll undertake to eat our two pack-horses for supper.”
Toma flushed with embarrassment, but still held stubbornly to his belief. Sandy’s laughter and Dick’s sceptical smile had not influenced him in the least.