“Yes; robbers and outlaws of all kinds.”
She seemed to be thinking of this as they walked on toward the scout’s horse.
The animal was caught by Buffalo Bill, and he then insisted that she should ride and that he would walk. He accompanied her to her uncle’s cabin home, which was not far away. It was situated near the stage trail that ran from Glendive to the railroad.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE EAVESDROPPER.
As Buffalo Bill and Lena Forest approached her uncle’s home, a man who had been in the cabin slipped out by the back door.
His horse was hidden in the grove two hundred yards off, and at first he thought of reaching it and riding hurriedly away. But he hesitated; and then, seeing an opening, he crawled under the floor.
“I’ll just hear what that scout and the girl aire talkin’ about,” he said. “And I’d like to know about them emeralds, if he or she has got ’em. He was to have given ’em to her. But I’m gamblin’ he ain’t any honester than other folks, and that he ain’t said a word to her about ’em. I’ve got to git my fist on ’em, er know why. Great howlin’ tomcats! Them gems aire worth a fortune that would make these hyer little common fortunes you hear about look sick. I’m bettin’ Buffalo Bill never hints a word to her about ’em. He’d be a fool to, and he ain’t a fool!”
He was hiding under the floor when Buffalo Bill and the girl came to the cabin and entered it. To his surprise, they were speaking of the emeralds which he had been sure the scout would never mention to her.
“Oh, she’s got ’em now, has she?” he thought, as he heard the talk. He pressed an ear to the boards above his head. “Oh, ho! He thinks there’s danger that some one will git onto the fact that she’s got ’em, and that she’s in danger with ’em in this section of the country. I reckon he don’t dream that I’m already onto the fact that there aire such gems; that I came on him when he was givin’ his promise to old Gordon there in the mountains, and that I follered him, hopin’ to git a chance to pinch ’em; and that I fired the pines, believin’ that I could roast him, and afterward git them emeralds from his dead body. Well, I ain’t got ’em yit, but I’ll have ’em!”
Though he so desired those emeralds, all his efforts to get them had been sneaking and cowardly in the extreme.