tour of the trail
on passing their quarters. This aroused their suspicion, and they
gathered in the man and his outfit, after pulling them out of a hole in
the ice to which the detour had brought them. The man said his name was
O'Brien, but he was sullen and would say no more. They took no chances,
but brought him before the commanding officer, who sentenced him to "six
months" for vagrancy. Several big bank notes were found on his person,
also packed in crevices on the sleigh, and also a strange nugget of
gold, shaped like a human hand holding a smaller nugget. It was found
out that O'Brien had displayed this nugget as a curiosity at a
road-house a few nights before, and later on it was found that Relphe,
one of the men who had vanished, had a penchant for curios, and amongst
them had this nugget and a specially odd coin. Things were beginning to
look interesting and, as Inspector Scarth wanted a man who answered
O'Brien's description for robbing the cache of Mr. Hansen at Wolf's
Island, O'Brien was sent up to Fort Selkirk and held on that charge.
Then Sergeant Holmes (rather a curious coincidence in detective names)
was sent on detachment to Fossal's road-house with Constable Pennecuick
to see if there were any traces of the lost men. Pennecuick proved
himself a veritable sleuth. In a short time he discovered a place on the
river bank where some one had climbed, although snow had fallen
plentifully since. He also found to his surprise a clear view of the
river up and down for miles. This was unusual in such a place, and on
investigation he found that trees had been cut down so that a look-out
could be kept. He examined the tree stumps closely, and found they had
all been cut with an axe which had three flaws in it, one at one end and
two near together. He kept portions of the wood, and later on discovered
that when O'Brien had been released from jail in Dawson, some months
before, he had been given his stuff back, and the police-sergeant
testified at the trial that he had furnished O'Brien with an axe (a very
necessary thing for travellers on the northern trails) in place of one
that had been lost. The sergeant said, "It was a spare axe and I
sharpened it for him, and gave it to him with a sort of apology because
it still had three rather large nicks in it, one at the top and two
close together at the bottom." Of course, Pennecuick did not know about
this axe when he found the trees chopped down, but his examination of