Page:Castlemon--Joe Wayring at Home.djvu/374

 "What do you suppose Matt intends to do with those guns?" inquired Roy. "Of course he wouldn't be so foolish as to offer them for sale around here, and they certainly will be of no use to him unless he took a big supply of cartridges at the same time he took the weapons."

"I've got my own idea about that," replied the guide. "It's only an idea, mind you, but I have good reason for holding to it. A year ago last spring, Matt got to acting just as he's acting now, because the hotels wouldn't send him out with their guests, and me and the rest of the guides tracked him down, and told him that he'd got to clear himself. He allowed he wouldn't do it, and that he'd make it hot for the fellers that tried to make him go, so we went to work and burned up everything he had, except his clothes and we'pons. Then he had to dig out; but before he went, he sent us word that if he couldn't do guiding for the hotels none of us should, for the reason that there wouldn't be nobody to hire us."

"What did he mean by that?" exclaimed Joe.