"Well, if he hasn't brought Runnion along!"
"Humph!" grunted Doret. "I don' t'ink much of dat feller. Wat's de matter wit' 'No Creek,' anyhow?"
The three new arrivals dropped down upon the moss to rest, for the up-trail was heavy and the air sultry inside the forest. Lee was the first to speak.
"Did you get away without bein' seen?" he asked.
"Sure," answered Gale. "Poleon has been here two hours."
"That's good; I don't want nobody taggin' along."
"We came right through the town boldly," announced Stark; "but if they had seen you two they would have suspected something, sure."
Runnion volunteered nothing except oaths at the mosquitoes and at his pack-straps, which were new and cut him already. As no explanation of his presence was offered, neither the trader nor Doret made any comment then, but it came out later, when the old miner dropped far enough behind the others to render conversation possible.
"You decided to take in another one, eh?" Gale asked Lee.
"It wasn't exactly my doin's," replied the miner. "Stark asked me to let Runnion come 'long, bein' as he had grub-staked him, and he seemed so set on it that I ackeressed. You see, it's the first chance I ever had to pay him back for a favor he done me in the Cassiar country. There's plenty of land to go around."