That nibbled piece of cracker on the very edge of the river threw them all off in their reasoning.

They took it for granted that the baby had fallen into the river at the place where they found the cracker.

If he had done so, he would have been swept away instantly.

No one could look at the river and doubt that--therefore no one did doubt it.

That a squaw should find him sitting down where he had fallen, two hundred yards above the town and in the edge of the thick timber, never entered their minds at all.