t I've got to catch
him. If you meet any of my crowd please tell 'em you saw me and I'm
O. K.; and if you're ever in Elk country don't fail to look us up. The
lodge door is always open."

"Hold on," laughed Scout Ward. "You can't shoo us this way, unless
you'd rather travel alone. What's the matter with our going, too?"

"Sure," said Scout Van Sant.

"But your trail lies down creek, you said."

"Not now. As long as you're in trouble your trail is our trail."

Wasn't that fine! But--

"You'll miss your connections with the rest of your party," I objected.

"What if we do? We're on the Scout trail, now, for business,--and
pleasure can wait. You couldn't handle that man alone--could you?"

Well, I was going to try. But they wouldn't listen. And they wouldn't
let me carry anything. They slung their packs on their backs, we crossed
the creek on some stones, and taking the trail on the other side we
followed fast and steady, the horse's hoof-prints pointing up the creek.
One shoe had a bent nail-head.

The Red Fox Scouts stepped along without asking any odds, although I was
traveling light. They walked like Indians. Scout Van Sant took the lead,
Scout Ward came next, and I closed the rear. Pretty soon Scout Van Sant
dropped back, behind me, and let Ward have the lead. I surmised he did
this to watch how I was getting on; but I had that soup in me, and my
second wind, and I didn't ask any odds, either.

The hoof-prints were plain, and the trail was first rate; sometimes in
the timber and sometimes in little open patches, but always close to the
foaming creek.

After we had traveled for about two hours, or had gone seven miles, we
stopped and rested fifteen minutes and had a dish of soup. The creek
branched, and one part entered a narrow, high valley, lined with much
timber. The other part, which was the main part, continued more in the
open.

The hoofs with the bent nail-head quit, here; and as they didn't turn
off to the left, into the open country, they must have crossed to take
the gulch branch. An old bridge had been washed out, but the water was
shallow, and Scout Van Sant was over in about three jumps. After a
minute of searching he beckoned, and we skipped over, too. A small trail
followed the branch up the gulch, and the hoof-prints showed in it.

Now we all smelled smoke again. It seemed to me that I had been smelling
it ever since that first time, but you know how a smell sometimes sticks
in the nose.