“Just take a good look at it.”
Beveridge stepped a little way forward and looked and looked.
“Well?”
Beveridge was silent. His eyes left the tree only to fix themselves on the ground.
“What do you think, Bill?”
Instead of replying, the special agent turned abruptly and walked away through the brush. He soon disappeared, but his assistant could hear him thrashing along. In a few moments he returned, and without a word set about building a fire. They all lent a hand, and soon were sitting around the blaze, moody and silent.
“Say, boys,”—it was Smiley speaking up,—“I have an idea. Let me take your compass a minute, Beveridge.”
There was no reply. Smiley thought he had not been understood. “Let's have your compass, Beveridge.”
Then the special agent looked up. “If you can find it, you're welcome to it,” he said. “Why, you haven't lost it?”
“If you've got to know, I've thrown it.”