“Not edzackly, but——”
“Then, swing along. In an hour or less Cody’s crowd will pick up our trail in spite of all we’ve done, and will be follering it. I ain’t any notion to be caught by ’em, out here.”
A cluck of anger sounded in the throat of the apelike man. He did not like the tone in which this was said to him. But he “swung along,” following hard at Benson’s heels.
On gaining the edge of the village, they were met and opposed by warriors. But Benson stood his ground.
“Tell Iron Bow that Little Eagle comes, with his servant, bearing gifts for the chief and warriors, and wishes to see him,” he said, making his communication in Ute.
Iron Bow, the chief, was already approaching, drawn by the hubbub. He arrived in no pleasant humor; and he stared in a forbidding manner at the apelike man with Benson.
“Little Eagle knows,” said the chief, “that it is not well for him to come again to the Ute village. Iron Bow is his friend; yet the chief must think of his people.”
“I don’t know what ye’re sayin’,” objected Gorilla Jake, “but I don’t like the looks o’ things hyer.”
Benson gave this no heed—he did not even look at Gorilla Jake, but merely smiled upon the frowning chief and truculent warriors; then he fished from a pocket one of the bottles of “doctored” whisky.