class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 34]"/> with a hiss. Whirling, he leaped into the shadows under the second deck, the new Colt in his hand; but after a hot, eager search he had to give it up, and hasten to the cabin, to peer searchingly around it from the door. The only enemy he had on board to his knowledge was Schoolcraft—and then another thought came to him: was Armijo reaching out his arm across the prairies?

Joe Cooper was intent on his game; Schoolcraft and the Mexican trader were taking things easy at a table in a corner, and both had their knives at their belts. They did not give him more than a passing glance, although a frown crept across the Independence horse-dealer's evil face. Seating himself where he could watch all the doors, Tom tried to solve the riddle while he waited to scrutinize anyone entering the cabin. At last he gave up the attempt to unravel the mystery and turned his attention to the card game, and was surprised to see that it was being played with all the safeguards of an established gambling house. Having a friend in the game he watched the dealer and the case-keeper, but discovered nothing to repay him for his scrutiny. An hour later the game broke up and Joe Cooper, cashing in his moderate winnings, arose and joined Tom and suggested a turn about the deck before retiring. Tom caught a furtive exchange of fleeting and ironical glances between the case-keeper and the dealer, but thought little of it. He shrugged his shoulders and followed his new friend toward the door.

Ephriam Schoolcraft, somewhat the worse for liquor, made a slighting remark as the two left the cabin, but it was so well disguised that it provided no real peg on which to hang a quarrel; and Tom kept on toward the deck, the horse-dealer's nasty laugh ringing in his ears. He could see where he was going to have trouble, but he hoped it would wait until Independence was reached, for always there were the makings of numerous quarrels on board under even the best of conditions, and he determined to overlook a great deal before starting one on his own account. It was his wish that nothing should mar the pleasure of the trip up the river for Patience Cooper.

He and his companion stopped in the bow and looked at the merry camp on shore, both sensing an undertone of trouble. Give the vile, frontier liquor time to work in such men and anything might be the outcome.

He put his lips close to his companion's ear: "Mr. Cooper, did you notice anyone hurry into the cabin just before I came in? Anyone who seemed excited and in a hurry?"

Cooper considered a moment: "No," he replied. "I would have seen any such person. Something wrong?"

"Schoolcraft, now; and that Mexican friend of his," prompted Tom. "Did they leave the cabin before you saw me come in?"

"No; they both were where you saw them for an hour or two before you showed up. I'm dead certain of that because of the interest Schoolcraft seemed to be taking in me. I don't know why he should single me out for his attentions, for he don't look like a gambler. I never saw him before that little fracas you had with him on the levee. Something up?"

"No," slowly answered Tom. "I was just wondering about something."

"Nope; he was there all the time," the merchant assured him. "Seems to me I heard about some trouble you had in Santa Fe last year. Anything serious?"

"Nothing more than a personal quarrel. I happened to get there after they had started McLeod's Texans on the way to Mexico City, and learned that they had been captured." He clenched his fists and scowled into the night. "One of the pleasant things I learned from a man who saw it, was the execution of Baker and Howland. Both shot in the back. Baker was not killed, so a Mexican stepped up and shot him through the heart as he lay writhing on the ground. The dogs tore their bodies to pieces that night." He gripped the railing until the blood threatened to burst from his finger tips. "I learned the rest of it, and the worst, a long time later."

Cooper turned and stared at him. "Why, man, that was in October! Late in October! How could you have been there at that time, and here, in this part of the country, now? You couldn't cross the prairies that late in the year!"

"No; I wintered at Bent's Fort," replied Tom. "I hadn't been in Independence a week before I took the boat down to St Louis, where you first saw me. There were four of us in the party and we had quite a time making it. Well, reckon I'll be turning in. See you tomorrow."

He walked rapidly toward the cabin, glanced in and then went to his quarters. Neither Schoolcraft nor the Mexican were to be seen, for they were in the former's stateroom with a third man, holding a tense and whispered conversation. The horse-dealer apparently did not agree with his two companions, for he kept doggedly shaking his head and reiterating his contentions in drunken stubbornness that, no matter what had been overheard, Tom Boyd was not going to Oregon, but back to Santa Fe. He mentioned Patience Cooper several times and insisted that he was right. While his companions were not convinced that they were wrong they, nevertheless, agreed that there should be no more knife throwing until they knew for certain that the young hunter was not going over the southwest trail.

Schoolcraft leered into the faces of his friends. "You jest wait an' see!" He wagged a finger at them. "Th' young fool is head over heels in love with her; an' he'll find it out afore she jines th' Santa Fe waggin train. Whar she goes, he'll go. I'm drunk; but I ain't so drunk I don't know that!"

CHAPTER IV.

TOM CHANGES HIS PLANS

Dawn broke dull and cold, but without much wind, and when Tom awakened he heard the churning of the great paddle wheel, the almost ceaseless jangling of the engine room bell and the complaining squeaks of the hard-worked steering gear. A faint whistle sounded from up river, was answered by the Missouri Belle, and soon the latter lost headway while the two pilots exchanged their information concerning the river. Again the paddles thumped and thrashed and the boat shook as it gathered momentum.

On deck he found a few early risers, wrapped in coats and blankets against the chill of the morning hour. The overcast sky was cold and forbidding; the boiling, scurrying surface of the river, sullen and threatening. Going up to the hurricane deck he poked his head in the pilot house.

"Come on in," said the pilot "We won't go fur today. See that?"

Tom nodded. The small clouds of sand were easily seen by eyes such as his and as he nodded a sudden gust tore the surface of the river into a speeding army of wavelets.

"Peterson jest hollered over an' said Clay Point's an island now, an' that th' cut-off is bilin' like a rapids. Told me to look out for th' whirlpool. They're bad, sometimes."

"To a boat like this?" asked Tom in surprise.

"Yep. We give 'em all a wide berth." The wheel rolled over quickly and the V-shaped, tormented ripple ahead swung away from the bow. "That's purty nigh to th' surface," commented the pilot. "Jest happened to swing up an' show its break in time. Hope we kin git past Clay before th' wind drives us to th' bank. Look there!"

A great, low-lying cloud of sand suddenly rose high into the air like some stricken thing, its base riven and torn into long streamers that whipped and writhed. The gliding water leaped into short, angry waves, which bore down on the boat with remarkable speed. As the blast struck the Missouri Belle she quivered, heeled a bit, slowed momentarily, and then bore into it doggedly, but her side drift was plain to the pilot's experienced eyes.

"We got