that. I wonder----" He broke off abruptly, shaking his head.

Simon gave a correct imitation of mounting a horse. "Him _klatawa_," he
announced. "Him Injun."

"Got on his horse and pulled out, hey?" said Farwell. "Yes, of course,
that's what he did. That's why the track is pressed in so deep. That's
all right. Simon, how many men stop last night?"

"Four, five cayuse stop," Simon answered. "Mebbyso four, five, man
stop."

"Well, four or five cayuses must have left a trail of some kind. You
find it. Follow--catchum. Find where they live--their _illahee_, where
they hang out. You get that?"

Simon nodded and went to his horse. Farwell frowned at the lone
moccasin track, and, lifting his eyes, beheld Simon in the act of
mounting. Contrary to the custom of white men, the old Indian did so
from the off side. Farwell swore suddenly.

"What?" Keeler asked.

"Hey, Simon!" said Farwell. "This man with oleman moccasin--him make
track getting on cayuse? Him stand so to get on cayuse. You sure of
that?"

Simon nodded. "Ah-ha!" he agreed.

"Then he's a white man," Farwell exclaimed. "This is the track of a
right foot, made while he was standing reaching for the stirrup with
the left. An Indian always gets on his horse from the wrong side, and
puts his right foot in the stirrup first."

"So he does," said Keeler.

"So this fellow is a white man," Farwell concluded triumphantly. "We
want a white man with a patched moccasin. You _kumtuks_, Simon? Injun
mount so. White man so--left foot up, right foot down. White man's
moccasin, Simon."

"Huh!" Simon grunted gravely. "Mebbyso white man; mebbyso _sitkum
Siwash_."

"Half-breed nothing!" Farwell declared. "Straight white, I tell you.
Now get ahead on the trail."

But whatever Simon's skill as a trailer, it availed little. In half a
mile the hoofprints merged with many others in a beaten track, and so
were lost. Simon halted.

"_Halo mamook!_" said he, signifying that he had done his possible. The
fact was so self-evident that Farwell could not gainsay it.

"That's an easy five for you," he grumbled. "We might as well get back,
Keeler. I never took any stock in that old buck, anyway. He's a gold
brick, like all the rest of them."

But Simon, when they had gone, kept along the beaten track. And shortly
he came to where McCrae had turned the buckboard around. Simon, after
examining the tracks, took pains to efface them entirely; after which
he ambled on, his usually