Long after dark that same evening the two lads came limping into camp to the no small relief of the anxious watchers, who had built a roaring fire to guide them back. After a fine supper they told the story of their day’s adventures which, as may be imagined, caused no small astonishment among their hearers. The fact that they had recognized the pony on which the wild-looking man rode, together with their description of the man himself, served quite sufficiently to identify him as the same fellow who had been seen by Ralph on the two former occasions. But so far as solving his identity was concerned, they were as far off as ever.
After a late sleep the next day, a visit was paid to the hole down which poor White-eye had terminated[181] his career, thereby causing Harry Ware and young Simmons so much trouble. The carcass of the bear lay there, and although tracks showed that animals—foxes and wolves in all probability—had been sniffing around it, the body had not been molested. When Mountain Jim had skinned it, they had a fine “silver tipped” grizzly’s skin to take back with them.
Harry had remained in camp during this expedition so as to rest his sprained ankle as much as possible. Mountain Jim had collected various herbs and pounded them into a paste which, when laid on the injured member, did it more good than all the liniments in the professor’s medicine chest. But it was still painful, for the exertions he had made in getting back to camp on the previous evening had not improved it.
After a consultation it was decided that the party could not well continue to the bow of the Columbia River without getting two more ponies to replace the dead and stolen animals. Mountain[182] Jim said that he knew of a ranch not more than fifteen miles off across the mountains, at which he could purchase the needed animals cheaply. It was decided, therefore, that he and Ralph should leave early the next day for the ranch and bring back two ponies with them. The others would have liked to go along; but in view of the apparent hostility of the mysterious man it was decided best to leave a strong guard in camp.
Bright and early the next morning the camp was astir. But Mountain Jim was hardly out of his blankets before he gave an angry exclamation and pointed to where the stores had been piled under a canvas.
The cover had been raised during the night, and by the disorder that prevailed among the supplies it was plain that several articles had been taken. But who or what could have done the rifling?
Bears were the culprits, according to Mountain[183] Jim’s first declaration, but he revised his opinion when Ralph’s quick eyes detected the print of a foot in the soft ground near by. A slight, misty rain had fallen in the night and the ground showed plainly the impression of a human foot, or rather of what was, apparently, a very old and broken pair of boots.
“Humph!” grunted Mountain Jim, “I guess it’s your friend that’s been and done this, Master Ralph. Yes, by hooky! there’s the hoof print of the pony he stole. I’d know it among a dozen. See here, that off fore shoe is broken.”
“Well, of all the nerve!” gasped Ralph. “To visit our camp on a thieving expedition mounted on a stolen pony from our pack train; can you beat it?”
“You can’t,” chorused the boys.
“Can’t even tie it,” commented Percy Simmons, standing with his hands in his pockets and legs far apart, surveying the scene of vandalism.
An investigation showed that some flour,[184] beans, and a big hunk of bacon had been taken, besides canned goods.
“Say, I’d like to get my hands on that fellow for just about five minutes,” declared Mountain Jim angrily. “The skunk’s broken every law of the woods. If he had been hungry and asked for grub he’d have been welcome, but not to sneak it off this way. I’d just like to get hold of him.”
“Couldn’t we notify the Northwest Mounted Police?” asked the professor mildly.
“There ain’t no station closer than MacLean’s,” was the reply, “an’ that’s a good sixty miles off the other way. Besides that, we don’t go much on police in matters of this kind.”
Mountain Jim’s face took on a grim look. It was just as well for that mysterious individual that he was not within reach of those clenched and knotted fists right then. However, even with the draught that had been made on their stock of provisions, they still had a large enough[185] supply to last them to the Big Bend, where Mountain Jim assured them they could get anything they wanted “from a pin to a threshing machine” at a store kept by a French-Canadian.
However, as they all felt a desire to push onward, they did not waste much time discussing the visit of the thief in the night. Instead, Mountain Jim and Ralph busied themselves with preparations for their start, and soon after breakfast they jogged off to an accompaniment of a chorus of good-wishes and farewells. Their road lay down the little valley in which they had camped, and before long an elbow of craggy cliff shut out the little canvas settlement from view.
The road was level for a short distance and they made good time, the ponies loping along as if they enjoyed it. Soon Mounta............