Sunset Ranch: A Story of a Boy's Adventures in the West — page 225: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Where Karl Went. 213 and he was grimly resolved to make a sturdy resis- tance ere allowing them to overpower him. Long he lay there in the grass watching what went on. The coffee had a pungent odor that was very tan- talizing to a hungry boy, and then the meat they cooked in a frying pan, bacon it seemed to be, still further excited his appetite. How long would they stay here? The folly of delay was well-known to them, but there was some recompense in the fact that their horses were recuperating, nor was a rest to be sneered at on their own part. In imagination Karl could see Kelly and his eager band of cowboys moving steadily along over the prairie, following the trail with that wonderful skill known only to those whose lives have always been in close sympathy with nature. He did not forget to watch the men closely, knowing how much depended on it. They were plainly uneasy, being aware of the fact that they had taken their lives in their hands in thus braving ‘the ranch owner. Frequently their restless eyes glanced this way and that, scanning the grass about the camp, as though fearful lest it might hold an enemy. Once Karl saw a pair of rat-like orbs belonging to Caleb Cross fastened intently upon the spot where he lay. “That feller’s on to me,” he muttered. Perhaps some slight movement on Karl’s part had caught the other’s attention. Presently the man arose, stretched himself and walked out of camp on the opposite side. Karl was not deceived in the least; he knew to a dead certainty the fellow intended circling around and investigating matters. It would be poor policy on his part to remain comiclooks C©