“God help him, if he does. I don’t know what sort of medicine Dr. Brady may have there. There’s vaccine for smallpox and drugs of all kinds. I’m sure that some of them are deadly poison. He’s apt to be more than sick if he tries it.”
Presently the trail wound into the hills. It went up and up and up, and then down and then up again. It skirted deep ravines and dangerous precipices. It crossed the wide basin of a lake. It continued on—the rutted tracks of that thief’s sledge—with the unbroken insistence of the passing of time itself.
“He’s certainly travelling and no mistake. He must be going almost as fast as we are,” complained Dick. “He’ll kill that team of mine.”
“Don’t you worry, we catch him. Pretty soon we catch him.”
“We will, of course, if we don’t lose his trail. The fool will be compelled to stop soon for something to eat.”
“Sometimes Indians go days without stop for something to eat,” commented Toma.
“Not if he thinks he has a store of precious things aboard,” grinned his companion. “His fingers will be itching to get at those sacks. He’ll want to explore the mystery of those medicine chests.”
Again Toma chuckled.
“This mail all same like ’em paper?” he inquired.
“It is paper,” replied Dick. “Envelopes, hundreds of envelopes, bulging with paper. Then, in the second-class mail pouches, there’ll be circulars and catalogs and newspapers, hundreds of pounds altogether to tempt his mounting appetite. I think he’ll relish the stamps too. They’ll be green and red, with a picture of King George on one side and mucilage on the other. The mucilage has a sweet, toothsome taste he’ll like.”