Page:B M Bower - Heritage of the Sioux.djvu/171

WAR-TALK ABOUT INJUNS a guess at Annie-Many-Ponies' reason for leaving and her probable destination. They wondered how old Dave Wiswell, the dried little cattleman of The Phantom Herd, was making out in Denver, where he had gone to consult a specialist about some kidney trouble that had interfered with his riding all spring. Weary suggested that maybe Annie-Many-Ponies had taken a notion to go and visit old Dave, since the two were old friends.

It was here that Applehead unwittingly put into words the vague suspicion which Luck had been trying to stifle and had not yet faced as a definite idea.

"I calc'late we'll likely find that thar squaw putty tol'ble close to whar we find Bill Holmes," Applehead remarked sourly. "Her goin' off same day they stuck up that bank don't look to me like no happenstance—now I'm tellin' yuh! 'N' if I was shurf, and was ast to locate that squaw, I'd keep right on the trail uh Bill Holmes, jest as we're doin' now."

"That isn't like Annie," Luck said sharply to still the conviction in his own mind. "Whatever faults she may have, she's been loyal to me, and 159