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Page 47
Probably the ex-showman was not as surprised to see Ruth Fielding as she
was to see him. But he was the first, nevertheless, to speak.
"Ho! so it's you, is it?" he growled, scowling at the girl of the Red
Mill. "Reckon you didn't expect to see me."
"I certainly did not," returned Ruth tartly. "What are you doing at
Benbow Camp, Mr. Fenbrook?"
"I reckon you'd be glad to hear that I walked here," sneered the
showman, and filled his cheek with a mighty mouthful. He wolfed this
down in an instant, and added, with a wide grin: "But I didn't. I saved
my horse an' outfit from the smash, and enough loose change to bring me
West--no thanks to you."
"I am sorry to hear you have failed in business, Mr. Fenbrook," Ruth
said composedly. "But I am sorrier to see that you consider me in a
measure to blame for your misfortune."
"Oh, don't I, though!" snarled Dakota Joe. "I know who to thank for my
bust-up--you and that Hammond man. Yes, sir-ree!"
"You are quite wrong," Ruth said, calmly. "But nothing I can say will
convince you, I presume."
"You can't soft-sawder me, if that's what you mean," and Dakota Joe
absorbed another mighty mouthful.
Ruth could not fail to wonder if he ever chewed his food. He seemed to
swallow it as though he were a boa-constrictor.
"I know," said Dakota Joe, having swallowed the mouthful and washed it
down with half a pannikin of coffee, "that you two takin' that Injun gal
away from me was the beginning of my finish. Yes, sir-ree! I could ha'
pulled through and made money in Chicago and St. Louis, and all along as
I worked West this winter. But no, you fixed me for fair."
"Wonota had a perfect right to break with you, Mr. Fenbrook," Ruth said
decidedly, and with some warmth. "You did not treat her kindly, and you
paid her very little money."
"She got more money than she'd ever saw before. Them Injuns ain't used
to much money. It's jest as bad for 'em as hootch. Yes, sir-ree!"
"She was worth more than you gave her. And she certainly was worthy of
better treatment. But that is all over. Mr. Hammond has her tied up
with a hard and fast contract. Let her alone, Mr. Fenbrook."
"Aw, don't you fret," growled the man. "I ain't come out here to trouble
Wonota none. The little spitfire! She'd shoot me just as like's not if
she took the notion. Them redskins ain't to be trusted--none of 'em. I
know 'em only too well."
Ruth went out of the shack almost before the man had ceased speaking.
She did not want anything further to do with him. She was exceedingly
sorry that Dakota Joe had appeared at Benbow Camp just when the moving
picture company was getting to work on the important scenes of
"Brighteyes." Besides, she felt a trifle anxious because Mr. Hammond
himself did not chance to be here under the present circumstances. He
might be better able to handle Dakota Joe if the ruffian made trouble.
She said nothing to Jim Hooley about Dakota Joe. She did not wish to
bother the director in any case. She had come to appreciate Hooley as,
in a sense, a creative genius who should have his mind perfectly free of
all other subjects--especially of annoying topics of thought--if he was
to turn out a thoroughly good picture. Hooley fairly lived in the
picture while the scenes were being shot. He must not be troubled by the
knowledge of the possibility of Dakota Joe's being at Benbow Camp for
some ulterior purpose.
Ruth told the girls about the man's appearance when she returned to the
shacks where the members of the moving picture company were spending the
night. And she warned Wonota in particular, and in private.
"He is as angry with us as he can be," the girl of the Red Mill told the
Osage maiden. "I think, if I were you, Wonota, I would beware of him."
"Beware of Dakota Joe?" repeated Wonota.
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