Old Joe was fairly stumped. So were the boys. The little gray man was
sick, feeble and apologetic, and yet they knew that he had stolen those
furs and he must be made to give them up.
“Guess we’ll leave this thing to Joe,” whispered Jack to Tom.
“The only thing to do. I don’t like this at all. I’d almost rather he’d
put up a fight.”
“Say, there’s no more wood by that stove,” said Jack; “guess he was too
sick to cut any more. We’d better go and get some ourselves. What do you
say?”
“All right. Let Joe do the talking. I’d feel like a ruffian myself to
cross-question a sick man, even if he is a thief.”
The two boys drew Joe aside. Then they left the tent. As they went,
their talk ran upon the strangeness of the twist of circumstances that
had made them become ministers to the comfort of a man who had wronged
them and led them a long, hard chase through the frozen lands to recover
their own.
As they chopped wood, they stopped every now and then and looked at each
other.
“This beats our experience with the two crazy miners,” said Tom, during
one of these pauses.
“Beats it! I should say so. I thought that was about the limit of queer
adventures, but this is an odder one still.”
“How a sick man could have gone through all that Pod has, I can’t
imagine,” said Tom.
“And he’s pretty sick, too, I guess,” commented Jack. “Well, let’s get
ahead with our wood chopping and go back and find out what Joe has
learned.”
In the meantime old Joe was almost equally at a loss. He needed time to
adjust himself to circumstances so utterly different from those that he
had imagined would await them at the end of the long trail. At last,
however, he found words:
“Say you, Pod, or what’ev’ yo’ name ees,” he began, “you know what for
me, Joe Picquet, an’ zee two garçons come here, eh?”
“I kin guess,” was the response, accompanied by a mild smile.
Old Joe smoked furiously. Here was a man he had come prepared to fight
over the stolen skins, and the man smiled at him.
“Ah ha! You can guess!” he burst out at last. “You bet my life you
guess. You guess bien dat you one beeg teef, eh? You guess dat? Boosh!”
There was no answer from the man lying under the shabby skin rug.
Old Joe began to find his task becoming more and more difficult. If only
the man would say something, make some aggressive move, he would have no
difficulty in letting loose his long bottled-up rage. But as it was, he
felt almost as helpless as the recumbent figure on the ground.
“Why you no answer, you—you Pod!” he exclaimed. “I want know.
_Comprenez-vous?_ Joe Picquet wan’ know wha’ for you break in his skeen
keg an’ take _un-deux-trois_ nice skeen?”
Again there was silence. Old Joe rose and came close to the man. This
time he shook a finger in his face.
“Attendez, you leetle coyote! You do worse as zees. You steal from two
garçons one black fox skeen. Where dose skeens? We come to get dem.”
The little man blinked as the finger was shaken in his face, but he made
no other sign that he had heard. Old Joe’s eyes began to blaze. This was
sheer obstinacy.
“You answer pret’ queeck or we load you on sled an’ take you Red Fox
trading pos’. Have you give up to zee jail. Now you talk.”
The little man made a peevish face and waved his arms about feebly. “I
dunno nuthin’ 'bout yer skins,” he said. “What’s the matter with you?”
This time it was Joe who did not answer. Near the head of the man, half
under the sacks that served him as pillows, Joe had seen some skins
sticking out. With scant regard for “Pod’s” comfort, he began pulling at
these.
For the first time, Pod began to grow restless.
“Them’s all mine,” he insisted, “t’aint no use your lookin’. Ain’t none
of yours thar, mister.”
“Where are dey, den? Where is dat black fox skeen you take from _les
garçons_ on zee Porc’pine Riviere?”
“I dunno, I’m telling you. I ain’t never been near the Porcupine River.
Dunno whar’ it is.”
“You don’t, eh? Boosh! Let me tell you, _mon ami_, you tell one beeg
story! Zee two garçons, dey trail you all zee way from dere, you beeg
teef. You’ snowshoes make different track, an’ see zee cigareette
stumps!” Several of the yellow paper wrappings were littered about the
tent. “Now do you say you are not zee same man?”
“Stranger, honest to mackerel, I dunno what yer talkin’ erbout.”
Joe turned to the pile of skins once more.
“We search every corner dees tent, den,” he said, with finality.
But as he was stooping over the skins, throwing them out one by one, and
scanning the pile the while with eager eyes for his own and the boys’
property, some subtle sixth sense made him suddenly wheel.
Out of the corner of his eye he had seen the little man’s hands make a
sudden move. He was on him with a bound. In a flash he had both the
little gray man’s hands pinioned in his own powerful grip, one over and
one under the shabby covering.
Then, with a swift movement, he yanked the skin blanket down. He
disclosed a hand holding a wicked looking revolver of heavy caliber. It
was fully loaded and cocked.
Pod was not the harmless individual he had appeared to be.