Page:Edward Ellis--Alden the Pony Express Rider.djvu/118

 Alden Payne was left for the last before returning again to Fleming. Shagbark had formed a strong liking for the youth, and this feeling was deepened by the last exploit of Alden.

“Wal, younker, have ye diskivered anything new?” asked the man, in his low voice, which could not have been heard twenty feet away.

“Nothing at all; how is it with you?”

“The same way; ye obsarve the Injins knows that one of the sentinels keeps his eyes open all the time and they ain’t taking any chances they don’t have to take.”

“But I have been shifted to this side,” replied his young friend, as if he accepted the compliment in all seriousness; “some of them, therefore, ought to show up here.”

“That’s jest the p’int; the varmints knows we ’spects something of that sort, and have moved ye over to this side, where ye’ll give ’em the same kind of welcome ye did afore.”

“Come, now, Shagbark, that’s enough,” protested Alden; “it happened to fall to me to pick off that wretch, but anyone else in my position would have done the same.”

“P’raps,” grunted the guide, and that was the utmost he would admit.