Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 15, 2025
The water was so clear that the bottom could be plainly seen from their saddles, the depth being no more than two or three feet. The ponies paused to drink, and, as they emerged on the other side and started up the gentle slope, Hazletine suggested that for a time at least they should be held down to a walk. One anxiety began to impress itself upon the minds of Jack and Fred.
He was restrained by two good reasons. Motoza was likely to seize him before he was swept beyond reach, and if he did not he would inevitably drown. Accordingly, Fred kept at it until finally they reached the ledge up which Hank Hazletine climbed twenty-four hours later. By this time a suspicion of the partial truth had penetrated the mind of Fred.
Had they known of it, the guide was confident it would have been betrayed by their manner, since they could have no suspicion that they were under surveillance at that time, and therefore would act their natural selves. What would have been the course of Hazletine had he seen Motoza, not doubting, as he did, the guilt of the miscreant?
A tall white man, dressed as a cowboy, with long dangling yellow hair and a thin mustache and goatee, and with rifle slung over his shoulder, had appeared on the further side of the plateau, and was approaching the couple at a deliberate pace. "Wal, I'm hanged!" exclaimed Hazletine; "if there isn't Bill Tozer! He's the last man I expected to meet in these parts."
He would not think of his young friend as wholly lost, nor allow himself to consider the awful possibility of returning home with the message that Fred would never be seen again. Jack felt it was time for action, not for lamentation. Hazletine was grave and thoughtful, but the youth had hardly finished his narrative when he said: "You haven't told me all."
"Good-by," and the visitor turned on his heel and strode across the plateau, disappearing on the further margin, where he had first shown himself. Hank Hazletine stood looking after him as long as he was in sight. When at last he vanished, an expression of scornful contempt darkened the bearded face of the cowman, and he muttered: "Bill Tozer, you think you're smart, but I understand you!"
A single warrior would have had no trouble in creeping undiscovered to a point from which he could have sent a bullet through the unconscious forms of Hank Hazletine and Fred Greenwood. This probability never occurred to Jack until he started on his return to the fire, from whose immediate vicinity he should never have allowed himself to have been tempted.
Hazletine explained that a large tract of land to the northwest and close to the mountains had been set apart some years before by the United States Government for exclusive occupancy by several tribes of Indians. They owned the land, and no white man had the right to intrude upon them.
And it was while lying thus, wondering what the hour could be, that he became aware that Hank Hazletine was standing at the mouth of the cavern, on the other side of the smouldering fire.
Hazletine had expressed the belief that in the interval between the first and second meeting with Tozer either he or Motoza would hold communication with their prisoner; consequently, if the Sioux could be kept under surveillance without exciting his suspicion, he was likely to give some involuntary and useful information.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking