“Rather,” remarked Overton, “an accomplished crook who has dabbled in several trades in the Columbia River region. The latest was a wholesale horse steal from a ranch over in Washington—Indian work, with him as leader. The regulars from the fort got after them, there was an ugly fight, and the reds reported Holly as killed. That is the last I heard of him. You were asking me yesterday if he ever prospected in our valley, didn’t you?” he asked, turning to Harris.
“A man made undue importance of by the stupid Indians,” declared Captain Leek. “He humored their superstitions and played medicine man with them, I’ve heard; and he had a boy for a partner—a young slip the gamblers called ’Monte’ down in Cœur d’Alene. Some said it was his son.”
“A fine instructor for youth,” observed Lyster. “Who could expect anything but vice from a man who had such a boyhood?”
“But you would,” said ’Tana, suddenly, “if you knew that boy when he grew to be a man. If he was bad, you’d want him to get off the earth where you walked; and you never once would stop to ask if he was brought up right or not—you know you wouldn’t—nobody does, I guess. I don’t know why it is, but it seems all wrong to me. Maybe, though, when I go to school, and learn things, I will think like the rest, and not care.”
Lyster shrugged his shoulders and looked after her 127 as she vanished into the regions where Mrs. Huzzard was concocting dishes for the mid-day meal.
“I doubt if she thinks like the rest,” he remarked. “How fiery she is, and how independent in her views of things.”
But Overton smiled at her curt speech.
“Poor ’Tana has lived among rough scenes until she learns to judge quickly, and for herself,” he said. “Her words are true enough, too; she may have known just such boys as Holly’s clever little partner and seen how hard it was for them to be any good. I wonder now what has become of young ’Monte’ since Holly disappeared. He would be a good one to follow, if there is doubt as to Holly’s death being a fact. I believe there was a reward out for him some time ago, to stimulate lagging justice. Don’t know if it’s withdrawn or not.”
“Square,” decided Harris, in silent communion with himself, as he surveyed Overton; “dead square, and don’t scent the trail. I’d like to know what their little game is with him. Some devilment, sure.”
On one pretext and another he kept close to Overton. He was studying the stalwart, easy-going keeper of the peace, and Dan, who had a sort of compassion for all who were halt, or blind, or homeless, took kindly enough to the semi-paralyzed stranger. Harris seemed to belong nowhere in particular, yet knew each trail of the Kootenai and Columbia country, knew each drift where the yellow sands were found—each mine where the silver hunt paid best returns.