’"Did you ever get your eyes on it?” asked George.

“Never!” was the reply.  “But he acts funny all the time, and I think he’s got it hidden.  When he gets ready to come back to the Hudson Bay country he asks me how I’d like to come up north with him and learn to be a trapper, so I says that if there’s anything on earth I want to be it’s a trapper, and I come up here, making him think I’m after fur, when all the time I’m after the Little Brass God.”

“Are you sure the man you followed is the man who brought the toy?” asked George, “You might have picked up the wrong man, you know.”

“No I didn’t!” replied Thede.  “I’ve heard this man, Pierre, muttering and talking in his sleep, and I know he has the Little Brass God hidden.  I’ll go back to Chicago some day with it in my possession and Old Finklebaum will pay me a couple of thousand or he’ll never get hold of it again!  Won’t it be a great story to tell the boys on State street about the times I’m having up here.”

The door opened and Pierre entered, anger flashing from his eyes.

CHAPTER IV

LOST IN THE STORM

“What you do here?” demanded Pierre, standing with his back against the door and facing George with a snarl of hate and suspicion.

“I got lost!” was the quick reply.

“You go ’way!” shouted the trapper.

“Aw, what’s the matter with letting him stay here all night?” asked Thede.  “These boys are hunting and fishing, and the kid got lost in the swamp.  He’s all right!”

“He follow me!” insisted Pierre.

“Sure, I did!” George replied, trying to give the impression that the matter was rather a good joke on himself.  “I heard you smashing through the bushes and I thought you were some kind of a wild animal, and so I followed you up.  I got so far away from camp that I couldn’t find my way back.  Then I saw your light and came here.”

“Where your gun?” demanded Pierre, pointing suspiciously to the boy’s empty hands.  “You no shoot without gun!”

George drew an automatic from his pocket and held it up in the firelight.  Pierre eyed it enviously.

“We hunt with these things!” the boy said.

Pierre continued to regard the boy with suspicion, for a long time but he finally seated himself before the fire and began to grumble because Thede had not been more active in the preparations for supper.

“It’s a wonder you wouldn’t come home and get supper yourself once in a while!” exclaimed the boy, “You needn’t think I came up here in the cold to wait on you, Old Hoss!” the lad added with a wink at George.  “I didn’t leave my happy home for any such menial service.”

Pierre grumbled out a few sentences in mongrel French and proceeded to prepare a solitary meal.  Thede winked at George and began cooking enough supper for both of them.