“Oho!  Ye be, eh?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Then I reckon there’s only one thing to do to put ye in a better frame of mind,” answered the mountaineer, shifting his rifle about suggestively.  “Now I’ll give ye two minutes to open up and tell all ye know,” was the stern announcement.

In the meantime Tad Butler had not been idle.  As the reader already knows, Tad had been deceived as to the location of the shot.  He had gone a long distance out of his course.  After a time he realized this and at once started back toward the plain.  It was his intention to make the opening where they had first sought to make camp, as it was there or in that vicinity that he was to meet Ned Rector.

The lad settled down to a trot.  Every faculty was on the alert, for Butler was a natural woodsman, added to which was an experience of some two or three years in mountain and on plain until Tad was familiar with many of the tricks of the mountaineer.

Suddenly the boy halted and stood with head thrown back sniffing the air.

“Smoke!” breathed Tad.  “There is a fire somewhere near here.  That means some one is in camp here.  I can’t be far from the edge now.  I must find out where the fire is.”

After a few moments of sniffing the lad decided that smoke lay off obliquely to the right of him.  Having decided upon this he started in the direction named, but proceeded with much more caution than before as he did not wish to stumble upon strangers until he had first determined whether they were friends or enemies.

At last he saw a faint flicker of light.

“It’s there,” muttered the boy.  “Now we’ll see.  I hope nothing has happened to Ned.  Still, he would have fired his revolver had he got into trouble.  He may be waiting for me down by the creek.  But I must find out what’s going on here before I take time to look him up.  I hope the others don’t come and blunder in.”

Tad paused in his reflections as the sound of voices reached his ears.  Young Butler, crouching low, crept cautiously through the bushes, each foot being placed on the ground as softly as an animal stalking its prey could have done.  Not a sound did the young woodsman make.  Of course his progress was slow, but it was silent, which was much more to be desired.

Some fifteen minutes elapsed before Tad reached a point where he could get a view of the fire.  He was obliged to crawl some three or four rods from that point ere he found a position where he could see the men who were near the fire.

The first to attract Tad’s attention was the mountaineer, squatting down with head thrust forward, his rifle held across his chest, the man’s hand over the trigger-frame.  Butler knew that the first finger of the right hand was toying with the trigger.  His glances followed the direction indicated by the muzzle of the weapon.  Then Tad’s face flushed hot all over.  There, back to a tree, a rope twisted twice about his body sat Ned Rector, defiance in face and eyes.  Ned was looking straight at his captor.  The situation was strained.  To Tad, it was maddening.