Marion regarded the sweating horses during one of the brief rest periods which enabled the animals to catch a few quick breaths. “Aren't you pushing the horses a bit fast?” she asked.
Hank tilted hack his sombrero. “To tell you the truth, I wasn’t anxious to have those other two along. I don’t want to disappoint them, in case I don’t find what I’m looking for.”
“What are you looking for?”
“The cabin shown in that photograph.”
“You think you know where it is?”
“Well, now,” Hank said, shifting sideways in the saddle and cocking his right knee over the horn of the saddle, “I can best answer that by saying that I know the places where it ain’t.”
She laughed.
“You see,” Hank went on, seriously enough, “that cabin is up on a ridge somewhere. I know just about when it must have been built. That is, I know it was built after the last real heavy winter — on account of the down timber. I know the general nature of the country it’s in. And, well. I’ve been doing a little listening around.
“A year ago a chap who could be this man they’re looking for showed up here and had a partner with him. They went up in this country somewhere and sort of disappeared. Everyone thinks they went out the other way through the White Cliff country. Had one packhorse between them. I talked with the chap who sold ’em the horse. One of the fellows was a pretty good outdoors man; the other was a rank tenderfoot. Now, maybe there’s a cabin up in here somewhere that was built and then abandoned.”
“Do you know where it is?”
Hank shook his head.
Marion surveyed the tumbled waste of wild, rugged country. “How in the world do you ever expect to find it in this wilderness if you don’t know where it is?”
“Same way the people who lived in it found it,” Hank said. “Take along in the winter when trails were pretty well snowed over, they had to have something to guide them when they wanted to go home.”
“How do you mean?”
Hank motioned toward the trees along the trail. “See those little marks?”
“Oh, you mean the blazes?”
“That’s right. Now, you see, along this trail you’ve got a long blaze and underneath it two short ones. They’re pretty well grown over and a person that didn't know what he was looking for wouldn’t find them. They show up plain enough to a woodsman.”
“And you think these men blazed a trail in to their cabin?”
“Must have.”
“How much farther?”
Hank grinned. “I’m darned if I know. I’m just looking for blazes.”
He swung around in the saddle and dropped his right foot back in the stirrup. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”
From little natural meadows which existed here and there along the trail, Marion could see out over an awe-inspiring expanse of country — mile on mile of tumbled mountain peaks, deep, shadow-filled canyons, high, jagged, snow-covered crests.
Hank Lucas looked back at her and grinned. “Lots of it, ain’t there?”
“I’ll say there is.”
Abruptly he reined in his horse.
“What is it?”
“There’s an elk,” he said.
“Where? I don’t see him.”
“Over there. Wait a minute, he’s going to bugle to the horses.”
From the shadows came a clear, flutclike whistle which started on a low note, ran to a higher note, then dropped through two lower notes into final silence.
“Oh, how beautiful!” Marion exclaimed.
“First time you ever heard an elk bugle?”
Her eyes were glistening. She nodded her head.
“He doesn’t like the horses,” Lucas said. “Thinks they’re a couple of bull elks which may be rivals. This country is pretty wild. He don’t know much about men. There he is over there in the shadows under that tree.”
She caught sight of him then, a huge, antlered animal standing in the shadows. Abruptly he pawed the ground, lowered his head, gave a series of short, sharp, barking challenges.
“He looks as though he’s getting ready to attack,” Marion said, alarmed.
“He is.” Hank grinned. “But he’ll get our scent before he does any damage, find out we ain’t other elks, and beat it.” He turned to her sharply. “I don’t notice you trying to photograph him. I haven’t seen you photograph anything so far. If you didn’t come in here to take pictures, why did you come in here?”
She said, “If I told you, would you keep it to yourself?”
“I might.”
The elk took two quick steps forward, then suddenly caught their wind, sniffed, whirled abruptly, and was gone, like some great, flitting cloud shadow, his big hulk dissolving in the trees.
Marion's speech was quick and nervous. “I came in here to find my brother. I think he’s the one who was with Frank Adrian. That’s why I was willing to go along with these other two.”
Hank spun his horse so he was facing her. “Okay,” he said quietly, “suppose you tell me about him.”
“I don’t know too much about it,” she said. “The last letter I had from Harry was last summer. He was at Twin Falls then. There was an ad in the paper stating that a man who was going into the hills for his health wanted a partner who was fully familiar with camping, trapping, and mining. This man was willing to give a guarantee, in addition to a half interest in any mines or pelts. It sounded good. Harry wrote me he’d answered the ad and got the job, that he liked his partner a lot, and they were going to head into the Middle Fork country. That’s the last I heard from him.”
“He write you very often?”
“Only once every two or three months,” she said. “But he’s close to me. He’s my older brother.”
“He give you any address?” Hank asked.
“Yes, the county seat back there.”
“You write to him there?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“The letters came back. I don’t think Harry would have gone away and... well, he wouldn’t have gone this long without writing unless something had happened. I've been wondering whether that ad was on the up and up.”
“I see,” Hank said. “Your brother’s name Harry Chandler?”
“Harry Benton,” she said. “My name is Marion Chandler Benton. I didn’t want to use the last name until I knew more about things. I thought perhaps if Harry had got in any trouble I might be able to help him. He’s impulsive and a little wild.”
Hank regarded her shrewdly. “Ever been in trouble before?”
“Yes. You see, he’s — well, he’s impulsive.”
“And what’s the reason you didn’t tell Corliss Adrian about this?”
“Because if he’s got into trouble,” Marion said, “I can do more for him if people don’t know who I am. I don’t want her to know. I’m telling you because you know that I’m in here for something other than photographs, and I want you to know what it is so — well, so you’ll know.”
“So I’ll quit trying to find out?” Hank asked with a grin.
“Something like that.”
“This brother of yours is sort of the black sheep of the family?”
“Yes.”
“But he’s your favorite, just the same?”
“Yes.”
“Want to tell me about the other time he was in trouble?”
“No.”
Hank gently touched the tip of his spur to his horse. “Okay,” he said. “Let's go.”
They rode on for another half mile, passing now through big-game country. Twice they saw deer standing watching them. Once they heard crashes in the forest as a big bull elk stampeded his cows out of their way, then turned, himself, to bugle a challenge.
“Usually the deer don’t hang around so much in the elk country,” Hank said, “but there seem to be a lot of them in here. I— What’s this?” He stopped abruptly.