Tom was up with the dawn, and breakfasted on the remaining trout and some soda biscuits. Then he saddled Pete and started up the trail that led away from the far end of the clearing. He wanted to waste no time in seeing Bill Tolliver.
After a stiff hour’s climb they came out on top of the mountain, and Tom stopped to let the pinto breathe.
The year before he had left the mountains, a forest fire which he had helped to fight had roared through here. It had destroyed everything in its path, even swallowing seventy-foot pines at one gulp. Now the burn was growing back up. Huckleberry brush grew profusely, with here and there a patch of fast-growing aspens scattered among it. Pete flicked his ears forward and looked intently toward a patch of aspens. Tom followed the horse’s gaze.
He though
