“Lie,” suggested Waller.
“No,” said Bounce, “it ain’t that. I don’t like that word. It’s a ugly word, an’ you shouldn’t ought to use it, Waller. It’s a error; that’s wot it is, in a feelosophical pint o’ view. Jest as much of a error, now, as it was in you, Mister McLeod, putting so little baccy in this here thing that there ain’t none left.”
“What! is it all done?” cried McLeod, rising, and seizing the canister; “so it is. I declare you smoke almost as fast as the Wild Man himself; for whom I mistook you, Mr Waller, when I saw you first, at some distance off.”
Saying this, he left the room to fetch a further supply of the soothing weed, and at the same moment two squaws appeared, bearing smoking dishes of whitefish and venison.
“That fellow knows something about the Wild Man o’ the West,” said March Marston in a low, eager tone, to his comrades. “Twice has he mentioned his name since we arrived.”
“So he has,” observed Redhand, “but there may be other wild men besides our one.”
“Unpossible,” said Bounce emphatically.
“Ditto,” cried Waller still more emphatically; “what say you, Hawkswing?”
“There is but one Wild Man of the West,” replied the Indian.
“By the way, Hawkswing, what was the name o’ the rascally trader you said was in charge o’ this fort when you lived here?” asked Redhand.