“We’ll try it. But we have to fool those two fellows down below there, as well as the buffaloes.”
“Why so?” asked Dig curiously.
Chet told him in a low voice while they ate just what he had heard at the other camp the evening before. He believed that Steve was watching for a chance to get away from them; but that, because of Tony’s insistence, the two villains would wait until they obtained some meat.
“Tony isn’t one to starve uncomplainingly in any cause,” Chet said decidedly. “And Steve doesn’t want to lose him—”
“Why not? He’s not much good to him, seems to me,” said Dig.
“Figure out how you’d like to be in the wilderness yourself, all alone,” said Chet. “Especially when there is occasion to keep watch. A man can’t travel all day and keep watch all night, too.”
“I reckon that’s so,” agreed Dig.
“If for no other reason, Steve needs Tony. They’ll keep together. They have had no luck hunting. Haven’t the proper guns. They are depending on us—”
“To be their commissary department, eh?” growled Dig.
“That’s about it.”