Part 6 (2/2)
”You ain't goin' to swim, are you? Where's your boat.”
”My pard's got an old craft, and he and I are goin' to pack it out next trip.” The stranger paused, blinking his eyes. ”Say, partners--you don't want to sell your boat, do you?”
Ben started to speak, but the doubtful look on Ezram's face checked him.
”Oh, I don't know,” the old man replied, in the discouraging tones of a born tradesman. In reality the old Shylock's heart was leaping gayly in his breast. This was almost too good to be true: a purchaser for the boat in the first hour. ”Yet we might,” he went on. ”We was countin' on goin' back in it soon.”
”I'd just as leave buy it, if you want to sell it. In this jerked-off town there ain't a fit canoe to be had. Our boat is the worst tub you ever seen. How much you want for it?”
Ezram stated his figure, and Ben was p.r.o.ne to believe that he had adopted a highwayman for a buddy. The amount named was nearly twice that which they had paid. And to his vast amazement the stranger accepted the offer in his next breath.
”It's worth something to bring it up here, you dub,” Ezram informed his young partner, when the latter accused him of profiteering.
After the sale was made Ezram and the stranger soon got on the intimate terms that almost invariably follow a mutually satisfactory business deal, and in the talk that ensued the old man learned a fact of the most vital importance to their venture. And it came like a bolt from the blue.
”So you don't know any folks in Snowy Gulch, then?” the stranger had asked politely. ”But you'll get acquainted soon enough--”
”I've got a letter to a feller named Morris,” Ezram replied. ”And I've heard of one or two more men too--Jeffery Neilson was one of 'em--”
”You'll find Morris in town all right,” the stranger ventured to a.s.sure him. ”He lives right next to Neilson's. And--say--what do you know about this man Neilson?”
”Oh, nothin' at all. Why?”
”If you fellows is prospectin', Jeffery Neilson is a first-cla.s.s man to stay away from--and his understrapers, too--Ray Brent and Chan Heminway.
But they're out of town right now. They skinned out all in a bunch a few weeks ago--and I can't tell you what kind of a scent they got.”
Ezram felt cold to the marrow of his bones. He glanced covertly at Ben; fortunately his partner was busy among the supplies and was not listening to this conversation. Yet likely enough it was a false alarm!
Doubtless the ugly possibility that occurred to him had no justification whatever in fact. Nevertheless, he couldn't restrain the question that was at his lips.
”You don't know where they went, do you?” he asked.
”Not exactly. They took up this creek here a ways, through Spruce Pa.s.s, and over to Yuga River--the country that kind of a crazy old chap named Hiram Melville, who died here a few weeks ago, has always prospected.”
The stranger marvelled that his old listener should have suddenly gone quite pale.
VIII
Ezram had only a moment's further conversation with his new friend. He put two or three questions--in a rather curious, hushed voice--and got his answer. Yes, it was true that the shortest way to go to the Yuga River was to follow up the creek by which he was now standing. It was only out of the way to go into Snowy Gulch: they would have to come back to this very point. And yes, a pedestrian, carrying a light pack, could make much better time than a horseman with pack animals. The horses could go no faster than a walk, and the time required to sling packs and care for the animals cut down the day's march by half.
These things learned, Ezram strolled over to his young partner. And at that moment he revealed the possession of a talent that neither he nor any of his friends had ever suspected. The stage had lost an artist of no mean ability when Ezra Melville had taken to the cattle business.
Outwardly, to the last, little lines about his lips and eyes, he was his genial, optimistic, droll old self. His eye twinkled, his face beamed in the gray stubble, his voice was rollicking with the fun of life the same as ever. And like Pagliacci in his masque there was not the slightest exterior sign of the fear and despair that chilled his heart.
”What have you and your poor victim been talking about, all this time?”
Ben asked.
”Oh, just a gab-fest--a tat-i-tat as you'd call it. But you know, Ben, I've got a idea all a-sudden.” Ben straightened, lighted his pipe, and prepared to listen.
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