How it came that he thus found Edith, and amidst such strange surroundings, gave him cause for much troubled thought. How came she at Back Load Trace, apparently protected by Martin and his Free Trappers? And what chance, or was it chance, that had brought Endicott and her together? Perhaps Blaze could answer some of these questions, and so, having, as we before stated, during their brief acquaintance acquired a large stock of confidence in him, to Blaze he applied.
"I ain't much acquainted with Dick Martin, an' I don't know more ner the law allows concernin' his private affairs. He come in here several years ago with a couple of men, an' put up a ranche. He war slightly green on the perairie, but hed the balance o' his teeth cut some year afore, an' he l'arned fast. Who he is, er what he is, I can't fur sartin say; but, he's at the head of as lively a gang of hunters an' Free Trappers as I want to meet. They make a purty wide range when the season's opened an' pelts is prime. The rest o' the time thar's allers more or less on 'em loafin' around Back Load Trace. Mebbe they're squar' an' mebbe they ain't. They never troubled me, but there's men in the gang that's not the kind to stick at trifles. I never heerd o' Martin himself doin' any partikiler deviltry; but, somehow, the place hain't the sweetest o' names. An honest trapper don't ginerally camp long about thar, an' when he meets any o' the men trappin' on the same stream he ain't anxious to stay."
"And the woman we saw and to save whom we started upon this trip? Who is she, where did she come from? What is her connection with this Martin?"
"Now yer askin' questions ag'in that I ain't up to the handle on. Ef ye'd talk about trace-chains an' beaver-bait you'd find me thar. I've tramped over hundreds o' miles an' never see'd a red deer or a white squaw; but the next time I went over the ground thar war plenty o' both. The tramp o' civalization allers brings both along in the same trapsack. Allers a-murderin' an' a-murderin' the deer as it brings 'em. Mebbe it ain't so all over the country; but I often wondered whether they'd all go under when thar weren't no more outskirts fur 'em to live on."
A shade of vexation passed over Winkle's face as he answered somewhat hotly: "As I'm not deer-hunting, I care little to speculate on their future destiny. My questions had reference to something entirely different."
"Yes," said Blaze, reflectively. "So I'll allow. Mebbe it all amounts to the same—mebbe it don't. I've seen deer-hunts that bagged no game, an' I've seen them which did. As fur the gal, I've hear'n of her oft'ner than I've seen her. She turned up one mornin' at Back Load Trace as though she war shook outen a bag. A kinder adopted darter o' Martin's; some one said onc't she war his niece."
"But what is she doing in such a place?"
"What does gals ginerally do? Rides in the country, shoots a good string they say, an' raises the devil now an' then. Bin the makin' on her too. So thin she couldn't git on more ner one side of a hoss, an' so weak she couldn't throw a shadder when she first arove. Bin a-pickin' up sence then."
"And the man I saw riding just behind her—what does he do here? Is he connected with Martin's establishment?"
"Which man was those? Describe the crittur."