“I feel sleepy, d–––d sleepy. Wonder if Rainy-Moon has got the sleigh loaded.”
Smith emitted another dense cloud of smoke from between his pursed lips; he seemed wrapt in the luxurious enjoyment of his smoke. Robb Chillingwood’s eyelids were drooping, and his pipe had gone out. Quite suddenly the trapper’s eyes were turned on the face of Grey, and the smoke from his pipe was chiefly directed towards him.
“There’s time enough yet,” he said quietly. “Half-an-hour more or less won’t make much difference to you on the road. You were talking of travellers’ tales, and I reckon you were thinking of fairy yarns that some folks think it smart to spin. Well, maybe those same stories have some foundation in fact, and ain’t all works of imagination. Anyhow, my experience has taught me never to disbelieve until I’ve some good sound grounds for doing so.”
He paused and gazed with a far-off look at the opposite wall. Then a shadowy smile stole over his face, and he went on. His companions’ heads had drooped slowly forward, and their eyes were heavy with sleep. Grey was fighting against the drowsiness by jerking his head sharply upwards, but his eyes would close in spite of his efforts.
“Well, I never thought that I’d get caught napping,” continued Smith, with a chuckle. “I thought I knew these regions well enough, but I didn’t. I 34 lost my way, too, and came near to losing my life–––”
He broke off abruptly as Robb Chillingwood slowly rolled over on his side and began to snore loudly. Then Smith turned back to Leslie Grey, and leaning forward, so that his face was close to that of the officer, blew clouds of the pungent smoke right across the half-stupefied man’s mouth and nostrils.
“I lost other things,” he then went on meditatively, “but not my life. I lost that which was more precious to me. I lost gold––gold! I lost the result of many weary months of toil. I had hoarded it up that I might go down to the east and buy a nice little ranch, and settle down into a comfortable, respectable man of property. I didn’t even wait until the spring opened so that I could take the river route. No, that wasn’t my way, because I knew it would cost a lot of money and I wasn’t overburdened with wealth. I had just enough–––”
He puffed vigorously at his pipe. Grey’s head was now hanging forward and his chin rested on his chest.
There came the sound of Rainy-Moon’s voice adjuring the dogs outside the door of the dugout. The trapper’s eyes flashed evilly in the direction of the unconscious Indian.
“–––to do what I wanted,” he resumed. “No more––no less; and I set out on foot.” He was anxiously watching for Grey’s collapse. “Yes, I was going to tramp to the sea-coast through these mountains. I hit the wrong trail, decoyed by a false track carefully made by those who waited for me in these hills.”––Grey was swaying heavily and his breathing was stertorous.––“I met my fate and was robbed of 35 my gold. I was drugged––as you poor fools are being drugged now. When it was too late I discovered how it was done, and determined to do the same thing by the first victim that fell into my clutches. I tried the weed and soon got used to its fumes. Then I waited––waited. I had set my decoy at the cross-roads, and you––you––came.”