“They were babbling so, talking a lot of stuff, that Billy and I got way ahead of them with Old Scout. We got up to Redmond’s trail and he excused himself to his party; said he wanted to make a call on them. They sat down and had a bite to eat and we went along with him.
“We were welcome as always and so was he. It seems he has known them all—even the first John Redmond. Lived in this cabin we’ve been using for thirty years. Says he got to be too old to live alone (he’s a man about seventy-five now, but splendid physique), and lives with a married daughter somewhere in the foothills. Earns a little now and then by guiding some of these would-be’s, but never could-be’s.
“However, they chatted awhile and Mrs. Redmond insisted upon him having a little snack. A perfect hostess, that lady! She made him promise to stop with his party on their way back to-morrow. Incidentally, she reminded us that we are expected also.
“We promised and left and resumed our talk with him. We told him how fine the Redmonds had been to us and the affair at the lake and forest.
“He said to escape from that place of torment was considered a miracle and he commented upon Westy’s ability to have stayed up the way he did.
“Then I asked him what he thought of the lake legend and the cliff. He took a chew of tobacco and wagged his head.
“‘Wa’al, I allus believed in it, same’s everybody roun’ here, I reckon, but here in the late spring one of them government scientists come ’long to look it over. He brought a powerful lot o’ loafers with him, too.
“‘They hired me to guide ’em up to the lake fust. Wa’al, after they monkeyed aroun’ with all sorts of queer-lookin’ appliances ’n’ brought up buckets full of dirt out o’ the side o’ the lake, we started on ’roun’ to the forest.
“‘I put my foot down flat when we got there and told ’em I’d camp outside on the trail until—they got out—if they ever did. They laughed at me, but in all my time a pusson was considered right crazy if they went in there.
“‘Along in four days they came out again and the scientist said to me, “Well, Old Scout, we got out all right, didn’t we?” I said, Yes, I reckon he did. Now what was it all about I asked him. He told me.