The Thundering Herd

by

Zane Grey

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X
CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER XVIII
CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER I

Autumn winds had long waved the grass in the vast upland valley and the breath of the north had tinged the meandering lines of trees along the river bottoms. Gold and purple, and a flame of fire, shone brightly in the morning sunlight.

Birds and beasts of that wild open northland felt stir in them the instinct to move toward the south. The honk of wild geese floated down upon the solitudes and swift flocks of these heralds of winter sped by, sharply outlined against the blue sky.

High upon the western rampart of that valley perched an eagle, watching from his lonely crag. His telescopic eye ranged afar. Beneath him on the endless slope and boundless floor of the valley, moved a black mass, creeping with snail-like slowness toward the south. It seemed as long as the valley and as wide. It reached to the dim purple distances and disappeared there. The densest part covered the center of the valley, from which ran wide straggling arms, like rivers narrowing toward their sources in the hills. Patches of gray grass, dotted with gold, shone here and there against the black background. Always the dark moving streams and blots seemed encroaching upon these patches of grass. They spread over them and covered them. Then other open spaces appeared at different points. How slow the change! Yet there was a definite movement.

This black mass was alive. The eagle was gazing down upon leagues and leagues of buffalo. Acres of buffalo, miles of buffalo, millions of buffalo! The shaggy, irregular, ragged herd had no end. It dominated slopes, and bottomlands, and the hazy reaches beyond.

The vision of the eagle was an organ for self-preservation, not capable of appreciating the beauty and sublimity of the earth and its myriads of wild creatures. Yet with piercing eye the eagle watched from his lonely crag. Boundless void, with its moving coverlet of black, the wide space of sky keen with its cool wind--valley of leagues, with its living heritage of a million years! Wild, primitive, grand was the scene. It was eloquent of the past. The future stretched away like the dim, strange, unknown purple distances, with an intimation of tragedy. But the hour was one of natural fruition, wild life in the open, with the sun like an eye of the Creator, shining over the land. Peace, silence, solitude attended the eagle in his vigil.

Yet a brooding sadness, like an invisible mantle, lay over the valley. Was it the dreamy, drowsy spell of autumn? Was it the pervading spirit of a dying season, reluctant to face the rigor of snow and ice? The fact was that autumn lingered, and nature brooded over some mystery, some problem, some blunder. Life was sweet, strong--scented on the wind, but there was death lurking somewhere, perhaps in the purple shadow of distance to the southward. The morning was bright, golden, glorious, yet it did not wait, and night was coming. So there was more than the melancholy languor of autumn in the still air. A mighty Being seemed breathing there, invisible and infinite, all-encompassing. It kept its secret.

Suddenly the eagle plunged like a thunderbolt from his crag and shot down and down, at last to spread his closed wings, and sail slowly and majestically round and round, over an open grassy patch encircled by buffalo.

In this spot, well toward the center and front of the vast herd, appeared about to be enacted a battle between a monarch and his latest rival for supremacy.

The huge leader, shaggy, brown, ragged, was not a creature of beauty, but he was magnificent. He had twice the bulk of an ox, and stood as high as a horse. His massive head, with the long shaggy hair matted with burrs, was held low, muzzle almost to the ground, showing the big curved short horns widely separated. Eyes of dark fire blazed from beneath the shaggy locks. His great back slowly arched and his short tufted tail rose stiffly erect. A hoarse rumble issued from the cavern of his chest--a roar at the brazen effrontery of this young bull that dared to face him.

Many and many had been the battles of this old monarch. For years he had reigned, so many that he had forgotten the instinct of his youth, when he, like the rival before him, had bearded the king of the buffaloes. He had to fight again, in obedience to that law which respected only the survival of the fittest.

The bull that had challenged the king to battle was also magnificent. He too lowered his huge head, and with short prodigious strokes he pawed tufts of grass and heaps of earth up into the air. His color was a glossy seal brown and he did not have the ragged, worn appearance of the monarch. His shaggy hair hung thick and woolly from head and shoulders and knees. Great rippling muscles swelled on his flanks as he pawed and moved round his enemy. He meant to attack. He shone resplendent. He seemed the epitome of animal vigor and spirit. The bawl with which he answered the roar of the monarch rang clear and hard, like a blast. He possessed something that the old warrior had lost. He had beauty and youth.

The surrounding buffalo did not appear concerned over this impending battle. They were aware of it, for they would raise their shaggy heads from the grass and gaze a moment at the king and his jealous aspirant. Then they would return to their feeding. It was noticeable, however, that the circle did not narrow; if anything, it gradually widened.

The king did not wait for his foe to begin the struggle. He charged. His dash was incredibly fast for so heavy a beast and his momentum tremendous. Square against the lowered head of the young bull he struck. The shock sent forth a sodden crash. The bull staggered under the impact. His whole bulk shook. Then he was lifted, head up, forefeet off the ground, higher, and with grinding clash of horns he was hurled heavily upon his back.

Under the great force of that charge the old monarch went to his knees, and the advantage which might have been his was lost. He heaved in his rage.

Nimbly the young bull rolled over and bounded to his feet, unhurt. Nature had by this time developed him to a perfect resisting force. His front was all bone, covered by matted hair. Swifter than a horse, as quick as a cat, he launched his bulk at his antagonist, and hit him with a shock no less terrific than the one that had opened the battle. But the old warrior received it as if he had been a great oak rooted in the earth.

Then with heads pounding and horns grinding, these beasts, relentless as nature itself, settled down to the wonderful and incredible battle of buffalo bulls. Bent and bowed, always head to head, they performed prodigious feats of ramming and butting, and endeavoring to give each other a fatal thrust with horn.

But under that heavy mat of wool was skin over an inch thick and tougher than hardened leather. These bulls were made to fight. They had extraordinary lung capacity and very large nostrils. Their endurance was as remarkable as their physical structure.

In a cloud of dust they plowed up the prairie, driving the grazing buffalo back and forth, and covering acres of ground in their struggle. The crash of heads and rattle of horns gradually diminished in vigor of sound, indicating that the speed and strength of the rivals were wearing down. Not so their ferocity and courage! It was a battle to death or complete vanquishment. In time the dust cloud blew away on the wind, and then the bulls could be seen in action less strenuous but still savage.

The old monarch was near the end of his last battle. His race was run. Torn and dirt-covered and bloody, he backed before the onslaughts of his foe. His lungs, like great bellows, sent out gasps that were as well utterances of defeat. He could not withstand the relentless young bull. Age must go down. He was pushed to his knees and almost bowled over. Recovering, he wearily fronted that huge battering black head, and then was shoved to his haunches. Again, narrowly, he escaped the following lunge. That was the moment of defeat. He was beaten. The instinct for life took the place of the instinct for supremacy. Backward, step by step, he went, always facing the bellowing young conqueror. There came intervals when he was free of that lowered battering head; and during the last of these he sheered away among the stragglers of the herd, leaving the field to the victor. The old monarch had retired to the ranks and there was a new leader of the herd.

The eagle soared back to his lonely perch, there to clutch the crag with his talons and sweep the valley with crystal eye.

Out to the front of the black mass of buffalo a whirlwind twisted up a column of dust. Funnel-shaped it rose, yellow and spreading, into the air, while it raced across the valley. That, or something as natural, stirred a movement in the fore-ranks of buffalo. All at once the leaders broke into a run, heading south. The movement, and the growing pound of their hoofs, ran through the herd as swiftly as a current. Then, magically and wondrously, the whole immense mass moved as if one spirit, one mind, dominated it. The throbbing pound of hoofs suddenly increased to a roar. Dust began to rise and blow back, like low clouds of yellow smoke, over the acres, and then the miles of bobbing black backs. The vast herd seemed to become a sea in swift and accelerating action.

Soon a rising pall of dust shrouded the thousands of buffalo, running under what seemed an obscure curtain. The volume of sound had swelled from rhythmic pound and beat to a mighty and appalling roar. Only the battlements of the upper air, assailed in storm by the ripping of lightning, could send back such thunder as now rose from the shaking earth. But this was one long continuous roll. The movement of buffalo in unison resembled a tidal wave and the sound was that of an avalanche. The ground trembled under the thundering herd.

The eagle perched motionless on his crag, indifferent to the rolling chaos beneath him. The valley-wide cloud of dust floated low down. Time passed. Halfway to the zenith rose the sun. Then gradually the tremor of the earth and the roar of hoofs diminished, rolled, and died away. The herd had passed. On his lofty perch the eagle slept, and the valley cleared of dust and movement. Solitude, loneliness, and silence reigned at the solemn noontide.

It was spring of an era many years after the lone eagle had watched the buffalo herd.

An upland prairie country rolled and waved down from snow-capped Rocky Mountains to spread out into the immense eastern void. Over the bleached white grass had come a faint tinge of green. The warm sun had begun its renewal of the covering of the earth. A flock of wild geese, late on their annual pilgrimage, winged swift flight toward the northland. On the ridges elk grazed, and down in the hollows, where murmuring streams rushed, clouded with the blue color of melted snow, deer nibbled at the new tender shoots of grass.

Below the uplands, where the plain began, herds of buffalo dotted the patches and streaked the monotony of the gray vastness. Leagues and leagues it spread, always darker for the increase of buffalo, until all was a dense black that merged into the haze of distance.

A river wended its curving way out across the plains, and in a wooded bend an Indian encampment showed its white tepees, and red blankets, and columns of blue smoke lazily rising.

Hidden in the brush along the river half-naked red men lay in wait for the buffalo to come down to drink. These hunters did not need to sally forth for their game. They had only to wait and choose the meat and the hide that best served them for their simple needs. They did not kill more than they could use.

Along the river bank, far as eye could see, the shaggy monsters trooped down to drink. Bulls and cows and calves came in endless procession. In some places, where the bank was steep, the thirsty buffalo behind pushed the row ahead into the water, whence rose a splashing mêlée. The tawny calves, still too young to shed their coats and turn the seal brown of their mothers, bawled lustily as they were shoved into the river.

Near the encampment of the Indians, where trees and brush lined the shore, the buffalo were more wary. They liked the open. But stragglers came along, and the choicest of these fell prey to the deadly arrows of the red men. A shaggy young bull, sleek and brown, superb in his approaching maturity, passed within range of the chieftain of that hunting clan. He rose from his covert, a lean, dark Indian, tall and powerful of build, with intense face and piercing eyes turned toward his quarry. He bent a bow few Indians could have drawn. He bent it till the flint head of the arrow touched his left hand. Then he released the arrow. Like a glint of light it flashed and, striking the bull behind the shoulder, buried half its length there. The animal grunted. He made no violent movements. He walked back as he had come, only more and more slowly. The chief followed him out to the edge of the timber. There other buffalo coming in saw both Indian and wounded bull, but they only swerved aside. The bull halted, and heaving heavily, he plunged to his knees, and then rolled over on his side.

After the hunters came the squaws, with their crude flint and bone implements, to skin the buffalo and cut up the meat and pack it to the encampment.

There the chief repaired to rest on his buffalo hide under a tree, and to think the thoughts and dream the dreams of the warrior. Beyond the white-peaked mountain range lived enemies of his, red men of a hated tribe. Other than remembrance of them he had no concern. His red gods could not tell him of the future. The paleface, who was to drive him and his people into the fastnesses of the arid hills, was unknown and undreamed of. Into his lofty serene mind no thought flashed of a vanishing of the buffalo while yet his descendants lived. The buffalo were as many as the sands of the river bottoms. They had always been; they would always be. The buffalo existed to furnish food, raiment, shelter for the red man.

So the chief rested in his camp, watching beaver at work on the river bank, as tame as were the buffalo. Like these animals, he and his tribe were happy and self-sufficient. Only infrequent battles with other tribes marred the serenity of their lives. Always the endless herds were to be found, to the south or the north. This chief worshiped the sun, loved his people and the wild, lonely land he believed was his; and if there was in his tribe a brave who was liar or coward or thief, or a squaw who broke the law, death was his or her portion.

A straggling band of white men wearily rode and tramped across the great plains centuries before that wonderful level prairie was to be divided into the Western states of America.

These white travelers were the Spanish explorers under the command of the intrepid Coronado. It was a large band. Many of them rode horses--Arabian horses of the purest breed, from which the Western mustang was descended. But most of them walked, wearing queer apparel and armor not suitable to such arduous travel. They carried strange weapons.

Hardy, indomitable, and enduring, this first band of white men to penetrate the great plains and the deserts of the South and West, recorded for history something of their marvelous adventures and terrible experiences and strange sights.

Many hundreds of leagues they traveled, according to their historian, Castaneda, over tremendous plains and reaches of sand, stark and level, and so barren of trees and stones that they erected heaps of the ox dung they found, so that they could be guided back by the way they had come. They lost horses and men.

All the way across these great plains of grass and sand the Spaniards encountered herds of crooked-back oxen, as many as there were sheep in Spain. But they saw no people with the crooked-back cattle. These weary and lost travelers, almost starved, found in the oxen succor they so grievously needed. Meat gave them strength and courage to go on through obstacles none save crusaders could have overcome. Sometimes in this strange country it rained great showers of hailstones as big as oranges; and these storms caused many tears and injuries.

Castaneda wrote:

These oxen are the bigness and color of our bulls. . . . They have a great bunch of hair on their fore shoulders, and more on their fore part than their hinder part, and it is like wool. They have a horse-mane upon their backbone, and much hair, and very long from their knees downward. They have great tufts of hair hanging down their foreheads, and it seemeth they have beards because of the great store of hair hanging down at their chins and throats. The males have very large tails, and a great knob or flock at the end, so that in some respects they resemble the lion, and in some others the camel. They push with their horns; they run; they overtake and kill a horse when they are in their rage and anger. The horses fled from them, either because of their deformed shape, or else because they had never before seen them. Finally it is a foul and fierce beast of countenance and form of body.

Coronado and Castaneda, with their band of unquenchable spirits, were the first white people to see the American buffalo.

CHAPTER II

All during Tom Doan's boyhood, before and through the stirring years of the Rebellion, he had been slowly yielding to the call that had made so many young men adventurers and pioneers in the Southwest.

His home had not been a happy one, but as long as his mother lived and his sisters remained unmarried he had stayed there, getting what education there was available at the little Kansas village school, and working hard on the farm. When Kansas refused to secede to the South at the beginning of the Rebellion, Tom's father, who was a rebel, joined Quantrill's notorious band of guerillas. Tom's sisters were in sympathy with the South. But Tom and his mother held open leaning toward the North. It was a divided family. Eventually the girls married and left home. Tom's mother did not long survive her husband, who was shot on one of Quantrill's raids.

Tom outlived the sadness and bitterness of his youth, but they left their mark upon him. His loyalty to his mother had alone kept him from the wildness of the time, and their poverty had made hard work imperative. After the war he drifted from place to place, always farther and farther toward the unsettled country. He had pioneer blood in him, and in his mind he had settled the future. He meant to be a rancher, a tiller of the soil, a stockman and a breeder of horses, for these things he loved. Yet always there was in him the urge to see the frontier, to be in the thick of wild life while he was hunting and exploring for that wonderful land which would content him. Thus Tom Doan had in him a perfect blending of the dual spirit that burned in the hearts of thousands of men, and which eventually opened up the West to civilization.

Not, however, until the autumn of 1874 did he surrender to the call. The summer of that year had been a momentous one in the Southwest. Even in years of stress this one stood out as remarkable, and the tales drifting up from the frontier had thrilled Tom's heart.

A horde of buffalo-hunters, lured by the wild life and the development of a commercial market for buffalo hides, had braved the Indians in their haunts and started after the last great herds. This had resulted in an Indian war. The Cheyennes, Kiowas, Arapahoes, and the Comanches had gone on the war-path. A thousand warriors of these tribes had made the memorable siege of a small band of buffalo-hunters and their soldier escort, and after repeated and persistent charges had been repulsed. The tale of this battle was singularly thrilling to Tom Doan. Particularly had the hunting of buffalo appealed to him. Not that he had ever hunted a buffalo, for in fact he had never seen one. But stories told him as a boy had fixed themselves in his mind, never to be effaced.

Early spring found Tom Doan arriving at the outfitting post from which an army of buffalo-hunters were preparing to leave for the long haul to the south.

The atmosphere of this frontier fort and freighting station was new to Tom, and affected him deeply. The stir of youthful love of wild tales was here revived. At a step, almost, he had found himself on the threshold of the frontier. Huge freighting wagons, some with six horses attached, and loaded with piles and bales of green buffalo hides, lumbered in from the level prairie land. The wide main street of the town presented a continual procession of men and women, mostly in rough garb of travel, and all intent on the mysterious something that seemed to be in the air. There was a plentiful sprinkling of soldiers, and pale-faced, frock-coated gamblers, and many stylishly dressed women who had a too friendly look, Tom thought. There were places of amusement, saloons and dance halls, that Tom found a peep into sufficient. Dust lay inches deep in the street, and the horses passing along continually raised clouds of it.

The camp on the outskirts of this town soon drew Tom. Here, ranged all around, it appeared, were the outfits of the buffalo-hunters, getting ready to travel south. Tom meant to cast his lot with one of them, but the tales he had heard about the character of some of these outfits made him decide to be careful. According to rumor some of them were as bad as the Comanches.

The first man Tom accosted was a tall, rugged, bronzed Westerner, with a stubby red beard on his lean face. He was encamped under a cottonwood, just bursting into green, and on the moment was busy jacking up the hind wheel of his huge canvas-covered wagon.

"I'll give you a lift," offered Tom, and with one heave he raised the rear end of the wagon.

"Wal!" ejaculated the Westerner, as he rapidly worked up his jack to meet the discrepancy occasioned by Tom's lift. "Reckon you're husky, stranger. Much obliged."

Tom helped him complete the job of greasing the wagon wheels and then asked him if he were a buffalo-hunter.

"I am thet," he replied. "An' what're you?"

"I've come to join one of the outfits. Are there really good wages to be made?"

"Wal, you are new heahaboots," returned the other, grinning. "My early fall hunt netted me five hundred dollars. Late fall then I made four hundred. An' this winter I hunted down on the Brazos, cleanin' up six hundred an' eighty."

Tom was amazed and excited over this specific information, direct from the hunting grounds.

"Why, that's wonderful!" he replied. "A fellow can make enough to buy and stock a ranch. Did you have a helper?"

"Shore--my two boys, an' I paid them wages."

"How much?" inquired Tom.

"Twenty-five a month. Are you lookin' fer a job?" rejoined the Westerner, with an appreciative glance at Tom's broad shoulders.

"Yes, but not for such wages as that. I'd like to go in for myself."

"It's the way to do, if you can buy your own outfit."

Upon inquiry Tom found that outfits were high, and with his small savings he could hardly hope to purchase even an interest in one. It would be necessary for him to hire out to the best advantage, and save his earnings toward buying horses, wagon, and equipment for himself. Nevertheless, opportunity seemed indeed knocking at his door. The rewards of buffalo-hunting, as set forth by the Westerner, were great enough to fire the blood of any young man. Tom experienced a sudden lift of his heart; a new and strong tide surged through him.

At the end of the road Tom came to a small grove of cottonwoods, just beyond the edge of the town; and here he caught the gleam of more canvas-covered vehicles. He found three outfits camped there, apart from one another, and the largest one was composed of several wagons. A camp fire was burning. The smell of wood smoke assailed Tom's nostrils with more than pleasurable sense. It brought pictures of wild places and camp by lonely streams. A sturdy woman was bending over a washtub. Tom caught a glimpse of a girl's rather comely face peering out of the front of a wagon. Two young men were engaged at shoeing a horse. Under a cottonwood two men sat on a roll of bedding.

As Tom entered the grove one of the men rose to a lofty stature and showed himself to be built in proportion. He appeared past middle age, but was well preserved and possessed a bearded, jovial face, with frank blue eyes that fastened curiously upon Tom. The other man had remarkable features--sharp, hard, stern, set like a rock. Down his lean brown cheeks ran deep furrows and his eyes seemed narrowed inside wrinkled folds. They were gray eyes, light and singularly piercing.

Tom had an impression that this was a real plainsman. The giant seemed a man of tremendous force. Quick to form his likes or dislikes, Tom lost no time here in declaring himself.

"My name's Tom Doan," he said. "I want a job with a buffalo-hunter's outfit."

"Glad to meet you. I'm Clark Hudnall, an' this is my friend, Jude Pilchuck," replied the giant.

Whereupon both men shook hands with Tom and showed the interest common to the time and place. Hudnall's glance was a frank consideration of Tom's stalwart form and beardless face. Pilchuck's was a keen scrutiny associated with memory.

"Doan. Was your father Bill Doan, who rode with Quantrill?" he inquired.

"Yes--he was," returned Tom, somewhat disconcerted by this unexpected query.

"I knew your father. You favor him, only you're lighter complexioned. He was a hard rider and a hard shooter. . . . You were a boy when he got--"

"I was fifteen," said Tom, as the other hesitated.

"Were you on your dad's side?" asked Hudnall, curiously.

"No. I was for the North," returned Tom.

"Well, well, them days were tough," sighed Hudnall, as if he remembered trials of his own. Then he quickened with interest. "We need a man an' I like your looks. Have you any hankerin' for red liquor?"

"No."

"Are you alone?"

"Yes."

"Ever hunt buffalo?"

"No."

"Can you shoot well?"

"I was always a good shot. Have hunted deer and small game a good deal."

"What's your idea--throwin' in with a hide-hunter's outfit?"

Tom hesitated a moment over that query, and then frankly told the truth about his rather complicated longings.

Hudnall laughed, and was impressed to the point of placing a kind hand on Tom's shoulder.

"Young man, I'm glad you told me that," he said. "Back of my own reason for riskin' so much in this hide-huntin' is my need to make money quick, an' I've got to have a ranch. So we're two of a kind. You're welcome to cast in your lot with us. Shake on it."

Then Tom felt the mighty grip of a calloused hand that had known the plow and the ax. Pilchuck likewise offered to shake hands with Tom, and expressed himself no less forcibly than Hudnall.

"Reckon it's a good deal on both sides," he said. "The right kind of men are scarce. I know this buffalo-huntin'. It's a hard game. An' if skinnin' hides isn't tougher than diggin' coal, then I was a meathunter on the U. P. an' the Santa Fe for nothin'."

Hudnall called the two younger men from their task of shoeing the horse. Both appeared under thirty, stocky fellows, but there the resemblance ended.

"Burn, shake hands with Tom Doan," said Hudnall, heartily. "An' you, too, Stronghurl. . . . Doan is goin' to throw in with us."

Both men greeted Tom with the cordial good will and curiosity natural to an event of importance to them. It was evident that Burn, from his resemblance to Hudnall, was a son. Stronghurl had as remarkable a physiognomy as his name, and somehow they fitted each other.

"Burn, you'll take Doan with your wagon," said Hudnall. "That fills our outfit, an' we'll be pullin' to-morrow for the Panhandle. . . . Hey, you women folks," he called toward the wagons, "come out an' meet my new man."

The stout woman left off washing at the tub and came forward, wiping her red hands on her apron. She had a serious face that lighted with a smile.

"Wife, this is Tom Doan," went on Hudnall, and next in order he presented Tom to Burn's wife, whom Tom recognized as the young woman he had seen in the wagon. Last to emerge was a girl of eighteen or thereabouts, sister of Burn and manifestly Hudnall's pride. She was of large frame, pleasant faced, and she had roguish eyes that took instant stock of Tom.

Thus almost before he could realize his good fortune, Tom found himself settled with people of his own kind, whom he liked on sight. Moreover, Hudnall had the same pioneer urge which possessed Tom; and the fact that Pilchuck, an old buffalo-hunter, was to accompany them down into Texas, just about made the deal perfect. To be sure, Tom had not mentioned wages or shares, but he felt that he could safely trust Hudnall.

"Where's your pack?" inquired Burn. "An' what have you got in the way of outfit?"

"I left it at the station," replied Tom. "Not much of an outfit. A bag of clothes and a valise."

"Nary horse or gun. Have you any money?" went on Burn, with cheerful interest.

"I've got two hundred dollars."

"Good. Soon as we get this horse shod I'll go uptown with you."

"Well, son," spoke up Hudnall, "I reckon Tom had better let Pilchuck buy gun an' horse an' what else he needs."

"Humph!" ejaculated Mrs. Hudnall. "If I know men you'll all have a say about horses an' guns."

"Mr. Doan, wouldn't you like me to help you pick out that horse?" inquired Burn's sister, mischievously.

"Why, yes," replied Tom, joining in the laugh. "I'd like you all to help--so long as I get one I can ride."

The women returned to their tasks while Hudnall went off with Pilchuck toward the town. Left to his own devices, Tom presently joined Burn and Stronghurl, who were not having any easy job shoeing the horse. It was a spirited animal.

"Doan, would you mind fetchin' that bay horse back?" asked Burn, presently pointing toward the other side of the grove, where several canvas-covered wagons gleamed among the trees.

Tom picked up a halter and strode away under the trees, at once pleasantly preoccupied with thought of the most satisfying nature. He came up with the bay horse, which he found eating out of a girl's hand. Tom saw and heard other people close by, but he did not notice them particularly. Intent on the horse, he did not take a second glance at the girl, until she spoke.

"I've caught your horse twice to-day," she said.

"Much obliged. But he's not mine," replied Tom, and as he put the halter over the neck of the animal he looked at the girl.

Her eyes met his. They were large, black as midnight, and they gazed up from a face almost as dark as an Indian's. Her hair was brown and appeared to have a sheen or light upon it.

Tom's glance became what hers was--steady, almost a stare without consciousness, a look of depth and gravity for which neither was responsible.

Then Tom withdrew his glance and attended to knotting the halter. Yet he could see her still. She was of medium height, neither robust nor heavy, yet giving an impression of unusual strength and suppleness for a girl. She was young. Her dress of homespun material looked the worse for wear.

"He's a pretty horse," she said, patting the sleek nose.

"Yes, he is. I hope the horse I've got to buy will be like him," replied Tom.

"Are you a buffalo-killer, too?" she inquired, in quicker tone.

"I expect to be."

"Milly," called a gruff voice, "you're not a hoss thief and you're not makin' up with strangers."

Tom turned hastily to see a big man looming across the camp fire. He wore a leather apron and carried a hammer in his brawny hand. It was impossible that this blond giant could be the girl's father. Even in that moment of surprise and annoyance Tom felt glad of this conviction. The man's face bore a thin yellow beard that could not hide its coarseness and brutality. He had bright, hard blue eyes.

"Excuse me," said Tom, stiffly. "I had to come after Mr. Hudnall's horse." Then turning to the girl, he thanked her. This time her eyes were cast down. Tom abruptly started off, leading the animal.

It did not occur to him that there was anything significant about the incident, except a little irritation at the coarse speech and appearance of the blond man. Nevertheless, that part of it slipped from his mind, and the vague, somehow pleasurable impression of the girl persisted until the serious and thrilling business of choosing horse and gun precluded all else.

The fact that Hudnall and his men left off work, and Pilchuck insisted on being the arbiter of these selections, attested to the prime importance with which they regarded the matter. Hudnall argued with Pilchuck that he knew the merits of horses as well as the latter knew guns.

So they journeyed into town, up the dusty motley-crowded street, rubbing elbows with Indians, soldiers, hunters, scouts, teamsters, men who bore the stamp of evil life upon their lean faces, and women with the eyes of hawks. Pilchuck knew almost everybody, it seemed. He pointed out many border celebrities to Tom's keen interest. One was Colonel Jones, a noted plainsman, who in the near future was to earn the sobriquet "Buffalo Jones," not like his contemporary, Buffalo Bill, for destroying buffalo, but for preserving calves to form the nucleus of a herd. Another, and the most striking figure of a man Tom had ever seen, was Wild Bill, perhaps the most noted of all frontiersmen. He was a superb giant of a man, picturesquely clad, straight as an Indian, with a handsome face, still, intense, wonderful in its expression of the wild spirit that had made him great. Tom thought he had never before seen such penetrating, alert eyes. Pilchuck mentioned casually that not long since, Wild Bill had fought and killed twelve men in a dugout cabin on the plains. Bill got shot and cut to pieces, but recovered. Tom was far from being a tenderfoot, yet he gaped at these strange, heroic men, and thrilled to his depths. Seeing them face to face stimulated and liberated something deep in him.

The supply store where Pilchuck conducted Tom and the others was full of purchasers, and except for absence of liquors in bottles it resembled a border barroom. It smelled of tobacco in bulk; and Tom saw shelves and stacks of plug tobacco in such enormous quantity that he marveled to Hudnall.

"Golly! man, we gotta have chaw tobacco," replied that worthy.

A counter littered with a formidable array of guns and knives appeared to be Pilchuck's objective point.

"We want a big fifty," he said to the clerk.

"There's only one left an' it ain't new," replied this individual, as he picked up a heavy gun. It was a fifty-caliber Sharps rifle. Pilchuck examined it and then handed it over to Tom. "I've seen better big fifties, but it'll do for a while. . . . Next you want a belt an' all the cartridges you can lug, an' both rippin' an' skinnin' knives."

When these purchases were made Tom had indeed about all he could carry. Hudnall then ordered the supplies needed for his outfit, and when that was accomplished Pilchuck led them down the street to the outskirts of town, where there was a corral full of dusty, vicious, kicking horses. It took an hour for Pilchuck and Hudnall to agree on a horse that Tom could ride. Having been a farm hand all his days, Tom was a good horseman, but he was not a bronco-buster. Finally the selection was made of horse, saddle, bridle, blanket, and spurs. When this purchase was paid for Tom laughed at the little money he had left.

"Things come high, an' they ain't worth it," complained Pilchuck. "But we haven't any choice. That's a good horse--young enough, strong, easy gait, but he never saw a buffalo."

"What of that?" asked Tom, with a little check to his elation.

"Nothin'. Only the first buffalo he sees will decide a lot."

Tom regarded this rather ambiguous remark with considerable misgiving and made a mental note of it, so he would not forget.

What with their purchases, and Tom's baggage, which they got at the station, the party had about all they could take back to camp. The afternoon then was a busy one for all concerned. Tom donned rough garb and heavy boots, suitable to life in the open. The change was not made without perception of an indefinable shifting in his spirit. He was about to face the perils of the frontier, and serious and thoughtful as he endeavored to make himself, he could not repress an eager, wild response. He tried out his horse, which he named Dusty, because at that time nothing but a bath could have removed the dust from him. Dusty gave a creditable performance and won the approval of all save Pilchuck. Hudnall, and his daughter Sally, particularly liked the horse. Tom saw that he could sell or trade at his discretion, and so for the time was well pleased.

The rest of the afternoon he spent helping Burn Hudnall arrange and pack the big wagon that was to transport their precious outfit, and later, out on the plains, haul the hides they expected to get.

"I was tellin' father I'd like to pick up a boy somewhere," said Burn.

"What for?" inquired Tom. "We can take care of this outfit."

"Sure, for the present. But when we get out among the buffalo we'll need some one to drive the wagon an' keep camp while we chase an' kill an' skin buffalo."

"I see. Then the idea will be a main camp kept by your father, and the rest of us in pairs with wagons and outfits will range all over?"

"I reckon that's Pilchuck's idea. From what I can gather there'll be a lot of hustlin' an' movin' when we strike the herds of buffalo."

"I should think it'd be a chase with no time for camp," said Tom.

"Reckon so. Anyways we're bound to know soon," replied Burn, grimly.

At sunset Tom heard the cheery call of the women folk to supper; and he was not far behind Burn in getting to the table, which was a canvas spread on the ground. They all appeared hungry. Hudnall loaded his tin plate, filled his cup, and then repaired to the wagon, and set his supper upon the seat. He was too big to squat on the ground, cross-legged and Indian fashion, but his stature enabled him to stand and eat from the wagon seat. Pilchuck, too, had his peculiar habit. He set his plate down, and knelt on one knee to eat.

They were all excited, except Pilchuck, and though this in no wise distracted from a satisfying of hunger, it lent a sparkle and jollity to the occasion. Tom was not alone in having cut away from the humdrum of settled communities and in cherishing dreams of untrammeled country and future home and prosperity.

After supper he again walked into the town, purposely going alone. He did not pry into his reason. This third visit to the main street did not satisfy his vague longing, whatever it was, and he retraced his steps campward.

When he reached the end of the street passers-by became scarce, and for that reason more noticeable. But Tom did not pay attention to any one until he heard a girl's voice. It came from behind him and had a note of annoyance, even anger. A man's reply, too low and husky for coherence, made Tom turn quickly.

A young woman carrying a heavy parcel was approaching, a step or two in advance of a man. It required only a glance to see that she was trying to get away from him.

Tom strode to meet her, and recognized the girl with whom he had exchanged words at the camp adjoining Hudnall's.

"Is that fellow bothering you?" demanded Tom.

"He insulted me," she replied.

Tom broke into swift strides toward the offender.

"Say, you!" he called, forcibly. But the man hurried away, at a pace that would have necessitated running to catch him.

"Never mind. Let him go," said the girl, with a little laugh of relief.

"This town is full of ruffians. You should not have come in alone," was Tom's reply.

"I know. It's happened before. I wasn't afraid--but I'm glad you came along."

"That package looks heavy. Let me carry it," offered Tom.

"Thank you, I can manage very well," she returned.

But he took it away from her, and in so doing touched her hand. The effect on Tom was sudden and profound. For the moment it destroyed his naturalness.

"Well--I--it is heavy--for a girl," he said, awkwardly.

"Oh, I'm very strong," she rejoined.

Then their eyes met again, as they had when Tom had reached for the horse and looked at her. Only this time it seemed vastly different. She looked away, across the open toward the grove where fires gleamed in the gathering twilight. Then she moved. Tom fell into step beside her. He wanted to talk, but seemed unable to think of anything to say. This meeting was not an ordinary incident. He could not understand himself. He wanted to ask her about who she was, where she was going, what relation she bore to the rude man who had called her Milly. Yet not a word could he utter. He could have spoken surely, if he had not been concentrating on the vagueness and uncertainty of himself.

Before they had quite reached the edge of the grove she stopped and confronted him.

"Thank you," she said, softly. "I'll carry it now."

"No. We're still a long distance from your camp."

"Yes--that's why," she returned, haltingly. "You must not go with me. . . . He--my step-father, you heard him. I--I can't tell you more."

Tom did not yield up the parcel with very good grace. "I may never see you again!" he burst out.

She did not answer, but as she relieved him of the package she looked up, straight and clear into his face. Her eyes held him. In them he read the same thought he had just exclaimed aloud. Then she bade him good night, and turning away, vanished in the gloom of the grove.

Not until she was gone did Tom awake to a realization that this chance meeting, apparently so natural on her part and kindly on his, just an incident of travel, two strangers exchanging a few civilities, was the most significant and appealing and thought-provoking experience of his life. Why had he not detained her, just a moment, to ask for the privilege of seeing her again? Still, he could see her to-morrow. That last look of her big black eyes--what did it mean? His mind revolved many useless questions. He found a seat at the edge of the grove and there he pondered. Night came, dark and cool. The stars shone. Behind him sounded the crackle of camp fires and the voices of men and the munch of horses at their grain.

A strange thing had happened to him, but what was it? A girl's eyes, a few words, a touch of hands! Had they been the cause of this sudden melancholy one moment and inexplicable exaltation the next, and his curiosity about her, and this delving into himself? But he did not call it silly or foolish. Tom was twenty-four years old, yet this condition of mind was new. Perhaps the thrill, the excitement of the prospects ahead, had communicated themselves to an otherwise ordinary incident. The thought, however, he ridiculed. Every moment of his musing tended toward consciousness of a strange, dreamy sweetness inspired by this girl.

CHAPTER III

When Tom roused next morning to Burn Hudnall's cheery call he found that he had slept later than usual for him.

He rolled out of his bed of blankets under the wagon, and pulling on his boots and washing his face and hands, was ready for breakfast and the eventful day.

The sun had just risen above the eastern horizon. West and southwest the rolling prairie-land shone green and gold under the bright morning light. Near at hand horses and cattle grazed. Far down the clearly defined road canvas-covered wagons gleamed white. Some of the buffalo-hunters were already on their way. Tom stood a moment, watching and thinking, as he drew a deep full breath of the fresh crisp air, feeling that whatever lay in store for him beyond the purple horizon--adventure, hardship, fortune--he was keen to face it.

While at breakfast Tom suddenly remembered his meeting with the girl, Milly. In the broad light of day he did not feel quite the same as in the gloaming of last night. Yet a sweetness stole pervadingly upon him. Glancing through the grove toward the camp where the first meeting with her had taken place, he missed the white wagons. That end of the grove was empty. The wagons were gone--and with them the girl. Tom experienced a blankness of thought, then a sense of loss and a twinge of regret. After this moment he thoughtfully went on eating his breakfast. Nothing was to come of the meeting. Still, her people were buffalo-hunters, too, and somewhere down in that wild country he might see her again. What a forlorn hope! Yet by cherishing it he reconciled himself to the fact that she was gone.

After breakfast his curiosity led him to walk over to where her camp had been; and he trailed the wagon tracks out into the road, seeing that they headed toward the southwest. His grain of comfort gathered strength.

"Our neighbors pulled out early," he remarked, halting where Pilchuck and Hudnall were packing.

"Long before sunup," replied Hudnall. "Did you hear them, Jude?"

"Huh! They'd waked the dead," growled Pilchuck. "Reckon Randall Jett had his reason for pullin' out."

"Jett? Let's see. He was the man with the yellow beard. Come to think of it, he wasn't very civil."

"I heard some talk about Jett uptown," went on Pilchuck. "'Pears I've met him somewheres, but it's slipped my mind. He's one of the hide-hunters that's got a doubt hangin' on him. Just doubt, it's only fair to say. Nobody knows anythin'. Jett has come out of the Panhandle twice with thousands of hides. He's made money."

"Well, that's interestin'," replied Hudnall. "He's just been married. My wife had some talk yesterday with a woman who must have been Mrs. Jett. She was from Missouri an' had a grown daughter. Married a few weeks, she said. My wife got a hunch this woman an' daughter weren't keen about the hide-huntin' business."

"Well, when you get down on the Staked Plains, you'll appreciate Mrs. Jett's feelings," remarked Pilchuck, dryly.

Tom listened to this talk, much interested, recording it in memory. Then he asked if all the buffalo-hunters followed the same line of travel.

"Reckon they do," replied Pilchuck. "There's only one good road for a couple of hundred miles. Then the hunters make their own roads."

"Do they scatter all over the plains?" went on Tom.

"Well, naturally they hang round the buffalo. But that herd is most as big as the Staked Plains."

Tom had no knowledge of this particular part of Texas, but he did not fail to get a conception of magnitude.

"When do we pull out?" he concluded.

"Soon as we hitch up."

In less than an hour the Hudnall outfit, with three good wagons drawn by strong teams, were on the move. The women rode with the drivers. Tom had the job of keeping the saddle horses in line. They did not want to head out into the wilderness, and on the start were contrary. After a few miles, however, they settled down to a trot and kept to the road.

Soon the gleam of the town, and groves of trees, and columns of smoke, disappeared behind a rolling ridge, and all around appeared endless gray-green plain, bisected by a white road. No other wagons were in sight. Tom found the gait of his horse qualified to make long rides endurable. The lonely land was much to his liking. Jack-rabbits and birds were remarkable for their scarcity. The plain appeared endlessly undulating, a lonesome expanse, mostly gray, stretching away on all sides. The soil was good. Some day these wide lands would respond to cultivation.

The Hudnall outfit traveled steadily until about four o'clock in the afternoon, making about twenty-five miles. A halt was called in a grove of elm trees that had long appealed to Tom's eye. It amused him to see the amiable contention between Pilchuck and Hudnall. The former, like all guides and scouts long used to outdoor life, wanted to camp at the first available spot where others had camped. But Hudnall sought a fresh and untrammeled place, driving some distance off the road to a clean glade under spreading elms just beginning to green. A shallow creek ran under the high bank. Birds and rabbits were plentiful here, and cat and coyote tracks showed on the muddy shore.

There was work for everybody and something of confusion. Further experience in making camp was essential before things could be done smoothly and expeditiously.

"I laid out jobs for everybody. Now rustle," was Hudnall's order.

The teams were unhitched and turned loose to drink and graze. Harness and collars were hung upon the front wheels. Tom scouted for firewood, which appeared plentiful, and the ring of his ax resounded through the glade. Hudnall and his son lifted the cook stove and mess box from a wagon, then the cooking utensils and tableware. A level spot was cleaned off, a fire started on the ground and also in the stove, then the meal preparations were turned over to the women. Hudnall erected a tent for himself and his wife. Sally's bed was made in the wagon. Pilchuck helped Stronghurl pitch a tent beside their wagon, but he spread his own bed, consisting of blankets on a tarpaulin, outside under the trees. Burn Hudnall put up a tent for himself and his wife, and Tom unrolled his bed under Burn's wagon.

At sunset they ate supper. The gold and pink of western sky appeared to send a reflection upon the winding stream of water. Everybody was hungry, and even Pilchuck seemed to feel something good in the hour and the place. If there had been any misgivings on the part of the women, they had now vanished. The talk was jolly and hopeful. Sally Hudnall made eyes at Tom, and then, seeing her advances were apparently unobserved, she tried the same upon Stronghurl.

After supper Tom chopped and carried wood for the camp fire that night and for next morning. This done, he strolled along the creek toward the grazing horses. Fresh green grass grew abundantly on the banks and insured reasonably against the horses' straying that night. Tom decided not to hobble Dusty.

A few hundred yards from camp the creek circled through a grove of larger elms and eddied in a deep pool. Here on a log Tom lingered and indulged in rest and musings. His thoughts seemed to flow and eddy like the stream, without any apparent reason. But when thought of the girl, Milly, recurred, it abided with him. Here in the solitude of this grove he seemed to remember more vividly, and after reviewing gravely all the details concerning her it seemed to him not improbable that she was unhappy and unfortunately situated. "I--I can't tell you more," she had said, hurriedly, in a tone he now realized held shame and fear. Tom meditated over that, and at the end of an hour, when dusk was creeping under the trees, he threw off the spell and retraced his steps toward camp. There was little chance of his ever seeing her again. With resignation to that, and the vague sadness attending it, he put her out of his mind.

Soon a camp fire blazed through the dusk, and seen from afar, with the black shadows of men crossing its brightness, it made a telling picture. Tom joined the circle sitting and standing round it. The air had grown cold, making the warmth most agreeable.

"That 'tarnal smoke follows me everywhere I turn," said Sally Hudnall, as she moved to a seat beside Stronghurl.

"Elm wood ain't so good to burn," observed Pilchuck. "Neither is cottonwood. Smoke smells an' makes your eyes smart."

"Mary has a likin' for hickory," said Hudnall. "Golly! I'll bet I'll never again have apple pie baked over a hickory fire."

"Unless you go back to Illinois," added his wife, dryly.

"Which'll never be, Mary," he replied, with finality.

His words, tinged with a suggestion of failure back there in Illinois, checked conversation for a moment. They all had places dear to look back upon. Pioneers had to sacrifice much. Tom gazed at the circle of quiet faces with more realization and kindness. Buffalo-hunting was but to be an incident. It had dominated his thought. In the background of his mind, in the future, had been the idea of a ranch. With these people home and farm were paramount. Tom wondered if they were not starting out upon an ill-advised enterprise. Not to think of its peril!

Day by day the Hudnall outfit traveled over the prairie, sometimes west, and then south, yet in the main always southwest. They made from fifteen to twenty-five miles a day, according to condition of the road and favorable places to camp. Now and then they passed a freighting outfit of several wagons, heavily loaded with buffalo hides. The days passed into weeks, until Tom lost track of them.

Down here on the great plains spring had surely come. All was green and beautiful. The monotony of the country had been broken up by streams winding away between wooded banks, yet the rolling level seemed to hold generally, viewed from afar. On clear mornings a gray heave of higher ground appeared to the south. What farther north had been an openness and sameness of country now assumed proportions vast and striking.

One sunset, when halt was made for camp in an arroyo, Pilchuck waived his usual work and rode off up a slope. Reaching the summit, he dismounted and, elevating a short telescope, he looked long to the southward. Later, when he returned to the camp, all eyes fixed upon him.

"See anythin'?" queried Hudnall, impatiently.

Tom felt a thrill merely from the look of the scout.

"Buffalo!" announced Pilchuck.

There was a moment's silence. The women responded more quickly to this good news. Hudnall seemed slow and thick. Burn Hudnall threw down a billet of wood he had held in his hand.

"Buffalo!" he echoed, and the quick look of gladness he flashed upon his father proved how much he had been responsible for this trip.

"How many?" demanded Hudnall, with a long stride toward the scout.

"Reckon I couldn't say, offhand," replied Pilchuck. "Herd is another day's ride south."

Sally Hudnall interrupted her father as he was about to speak again: "Oh, I'm crazy to see a herd of buffalo. Are there lots of them?"

"Tolerable many," replied Pilchuck, with a look of professional pride. "Reckon this herd is about fifteen miles long an' three or four deep!"

Then Hudnall let out a stentorian roar, and that was a signal for equally sincere if not so exuberant a rejoicing from the others.

Next day's travel was the longest Tom had ever endured. The ground was dusty, the sun hot, the miles interminable, and there appeared ahead only the gray-green stretch of plain, leading the eyes with false hopes. But at last, toward sunset, a fringe of winding foliage marked the course of a stream. It seemed a goal. Beyond that water the great herd of buffalo must be grazing. An hour more of weary travel over uneven prairie--for Pilchuck had turned off the road early that morning--brought the outfit down into a coulee, the wildest and most attractive camp site that had yet fallen to them.

Tom made short work of his camp duties that evening, and soon was climbing the highest ridge. He climbed fast in his eagerness. Abruptly, then, he reached the top and looking westward, suddenly became transfixed.

The sun was setting in a golden flare that enveloped the wide plain below. Half a mile from where he stood was an immense herd of huge woolly beasts, wild and strange to his sight, yet unmistakably buffalo. Tom experienced the most tingling thrill of his life. What a wonderful spectacle! It was not at all what he had pictured from tales he had heard. This scene was beautiful; and the huge straggling bulls seemed the grandest of big game beasts. Thousands of buffalo! Tom reveled in his opportunity and made the most of it. He saw that the herd circled away out of sight beyond the other end of the ridge upon which he stood. Long he gazed, and felt that he would never forget his first sight of a buffalo herd.

Upon his return to camp he found that he was not the only one late for supper. Hudnall had been out with Pilchuck. Burn was on the moment coming in with his wife and sister, who were talking excitedly about what they had seen.

"How many did you see?" asked Hudnall, of Tom.

"Oh, I've no idea--all of five thousand--and I couldn't see the end of the herd," replied Tom.

"We saw ten thousand, an' that on the other side of the ridge from you," added Hudnall, tensely. His big eyes were alight and he seemed to look afar. Tom sensed that Hudnall had not responded to the wildness and beauty of the spectacle. He saw thousands of hides to sell.

"Reckon I heard shootin' down the river a couple of miles," said Pilchuck. "There's another outfit on the trail. We'll be lucky if we don't run into a dozen."

"Is this the main herd you spoke of?" inquired Tom.

"No. This is only a little bunch," returned Pilchuck.

Mrs. Hudnall broke up the colloquy. "Are you all daffy about buffalo? Supper's gettin' cold."

"Mary, you'll be fryin' buffalo steak for me to-morrow night," rejoined her husband, gayly.

After supper Hudnall called the men aside for the purpose of consultation.

"Pilchuck an' me are pardners on this deal," he said. "We'll pay thirty cents a hide. That means skinnin', haulin' the hide to camp, an' peggin' it out. No difference who kills the buffalo."

"That's more than you'll get paid by most outfits," added Pilchuck.

Stronghurl and Burn agreed on that figure; and as for Tom he frankly admitted he thought thirty cents a hide was big pay.

"Huh! Wait till you skin your first buffalo," said the scout, grinning. "You'll swear thirty dollars too little."

"Well, my part of this deal is settled. I furnish supplies an' pay for hides," said Hudnall. "Jude here will boss the hunt."

"Not much bossin'," said that individual. "We're a little farther south than I've hunted. I rode through here with some soldiers last fall, an' know the country. This bunch of buffalo is hangin' along the river. Reckon there's buffalo for miles. They'll hang around here, unless too many outfits get chasin' them. A good way to hunt is to catch them comin' to drink. Aim to hit behind the shoulder, an' shoot till he drops. Sometimes it takes two or three bullets, an' sometimes five on the old bulls. When you hunt out in the open you've got to ride like hell, chase them, an' keep shootin' till your cartridges are all gone."

"That's easy, an' ought to be heaps of fun," said Burn.

"Reckon so. An' don't forget it's dangerous. Keep out of their reach. The real hard work comes in skinnin' an' peggin' out. Before you get good enough at that to make three dollars a day, you'll be sick of the job."

"Three dollars!" echoed Burn, in scorn. "I expect to make five times that much."

Tom had much the same aspiration, but he did not voice it. Pilchuck looked amused and mysterious enough to restrain undue enthusiasm.

"Finally--an' this is a hunch you want to take serious," went on Pilchuck, lowering his voice so the women could not hear. "We might run on to Indians."

That sobered all the listeners.

"Last summer was bad an' fall was worse," he continued. "I don't know now how conditions are or what the Indians are doin.' Reckon somebody, hunters or soldiers, will happen along an' tell us. My belief is there'll be some tough fights this year. But, of course, the redskins can't be everywhere, an' these buffalo are thick an' range far. We may be lucky an' never see a Comanche. But we'll have to keep our eyes peeled all the time an' mustn't get far apart. If we see or hear of Indians, we'll move camp an' stand guard at night."

"Jude, that's stranger talk than you've used yet," responded Hudnall, in surprise and concern.

"Reckon so. I'm not worryin.' I'm just tellin' you. There'll be a heap of hunters in here this summer. An' like as not the soldiers will see what women there are safe to the fort or some well-protected freightin' post."

Tom thought of the dark-eyed girl, Milly. Almost he had forgotten. How long ago that meeting seemed! Where was she now? He convinced himself that Pilchuck's assurance of the protection of soldiers applied to all the women who might be with the hunting bands.

No more was said about Indians. Interest reverted strongly to the proposed hunt to begin on the morrow. Tom fell in with the spirit of the hour and stayed up late round the camp fire, listening to the talk and joining in. Once their animated discussion was silenced by a mournful howl from the ridge-top where Tom had climbed to see the buffalo. It was a strange sound, deep and prolonged, like the bay of a hound on a deer scent, only infinitely wilder.

"What's that?" asked somebody.

"Wolf," replied Pilchuck. "Not a coyote, mind you, but a real old king of the plains. There's a lot of wolves hang with the buffalo."

The cry was not repeated then, but later, as Tom composed himself in his warm blankets, it pealed out again, wonderfully breaking the stillness. How hungry and full of loneliness! It made Tom shiver. It seemed a herald of wilderness.

Tom was the first to arise next morning, and this time it was the ring of his ax and the crash of wood thrown into the camp-fire circle that roused the others. When Stronghurl sallied forth to find the horses, daylight had broken clear; and by the time breakfast was ready the sun was up.

Pilchuck, returning from the ridge-top, reported that buffalo were in sight, all along the river, as far as he could see. They were a goodly distance out on the plain and were not yet working in for a drink.

"I'll take my turn hangin' round camp," said Hudnall, plainly with an effort! "There's a lot to do, an' some one must see after the women folks."

"It'd be a good idea for you to climb the ridge every two hours or so an' take a look," replied Pilchuck, casually. But his glance at Hudnall was not casual. "I'll leave my telescope for you. Don't miss anythin'."

The men saddled their horses and donned the heavy cartridge belts. They also carried extra cartridges in their pockets. Tom felt weighted down as if by a thousand pounds. He had neglected to buy a saddle sheath for his gun, and therefore would have to carry it in his hand--an awkward task while riding.

They rode behind Pilchuck down the river, and forded it at a shallow sand-barred place, over which the horses had to go at brisk gait to avoid miring.

"How're we ever goin' to get the wagons across?" queried Burn Hudnall.

"Reckon we've no choice," replied Pilchuck. "The hides have to be hauled to camp. You see the actual chasin' an' killin' of buffalo doesn't take much time. Then the real work begins. We'll have all the rest of the day--an' night, to skin, haul to camp, an' peg out."

This side of the river bank was more wooded and less precipitous than the other. Buffalo tracks were as thick as cattle tracks round a water-hole. The riders halted at the top of the slope where the level plain began. Out on the grassy expanse, perhaps a mile or more, extended a shaggy dark line like a wall.

"Reckon there's your buffalo," said the scout. "Now we'll scatter an' wait under cover for an hour or so. Hide in the brush or behind a bank, anywhere till some come close. Then burn powder! An' don't quit the buffalo you shoot at till he's down. When they run off, chase them, an' shoot from your horses. The chase won't last long, for the buffalo will run away from you."

Pilchuck stationed Tom at this point, and rode on down the edge of the plain with the other men. They passed out of sight. In that direction Tom could not see far, owing to rising ground. To the southwest, however, the herd extended until it was impossible to distinguish between vague black streaks of buffalo and dim distance.

"Pilchuck said this was only a little bunch!" soliloquized Tom, as he scanned the plain-wide band of beasts.

Dismounting, he held his horse and stood at the edge of the timber, watching and listening. It was a wonderfully satisfying moment. He tried to be calm, but that was impossible. He recognized what had always been deep in him--the love of adventure and freedom--the passion to seek these in unknown places. Here, then, he stood at his post above the bank of a timber-bordered river in the Panhandle of Texas with a herd of buffalo in sight. He saw coyotes, too, and a larger beast, gray in color, that he was sure was a wolf. Hawks and buzzards sailed against the blue sky. Down through the trees, near the river, he espied a flock of wild turkeys. Then, in connection with all he saw, and the keenness of the morning which he felt, he remembered the scout's caution about Indians. Tom thought that he ought to be worried, even frightened, but he was neither. This moment was the most mysteriously full and satisfying of his life.

Opposite his point the buffalo did not approach more closely; he observed, however, that to the eastward they appeared to be encroaching upon the river brakes.

Suddenly then he was thrilled by gun-shots. Boom! Boom! . . . Boom-boom! His comrades had opened the hunt.

"What'll I do now?" he mused, gazing down the river, then out toward the herd. It presented no change that he could distinguish. "I was told to stay here. But with shooting begun, I don't think any buffalo will come now."

Soon after that a gun roared out much closer, indeed, just over the rise of plain below Tom.

"That's a big fifty!" he ejaculated, aloud.

Far beyond, perhaps two miles distant, sounded a report of a Sharps, low but clear on the still morning air. Another and another! Tom began to tingle with anticipation. Most likely his comrades would chase the buffalo his way. Next he heard a shot apparently between the one that had sounded close and the one far away. So all three of his fellow hunters had gotten into action. Tom grew restive. Peering out at the herd, he discovered it was moving. A low trample of many hoofs assailed his ears. Dust partially obscured the buffalo. They appeared to be running back into the gray expanse. Suddenly Tom became aware of heavy and continuous booming of guns--close, medium, and far-away reports mingling. As he listened it dawned on him that all the reports were diminishing in sound. His comrades were chasing the buffalo and getting farther away. After a while he heard no more. Also the dust-shrouded buffalo opposite his position had disappeared. His disappointment was keen.

Presently a horseman appeared on the crest of the ridge that had hidden the chase from him. The white horse was Pilchuck's. Tom saw the rider wave his hat, and taking the action as a signal he mounted and rode at a gallop to the ridge, striking its summit some few hundred yards to the right. Here he had unobstructed view. Wide gray-green barren rolling plain, hazy with dust! The herd of buffalo was not in sight. Tom rode on to meet Pilchuck.

"Tough luck for you," said the scout. "They were workin' in to the river below here."

"Did you kill any?" queried Tom, eagerly.

"I downed twenty-one," replied Pilchuck. "An' as I was ridin' back I met Stronghurl. He was cussin' because he'd only got five. An' Burn burned a lot of powder. But so far as I could see he got only one."

"No!" ejaculated Tom. "Why, he was sure of dozens."

"Reckon he knows more now," returned Pilchuck. "You ride down there an' see how many you can skin. I'll go back to camp, hitch up a wagon, an' try to come back across the river."

The scout rode away, and Tom, turning his horse eastward, took to a trot down the immense gradual slope. After searching the plain he espied a horse grazing, and then a dark shaggy mound which manifestly was a slain buffalo. Tom spurred his horse, rapidly covering the distance between. Soon he saw Burn at work skinning the buffalo.

"Good for you!" shouted Tom, as he galloped up.

"Helluva job--this skinnin'!" yelled Burn, flashing a red and sweaty face toward Tom. "Hey! Look out!"

But his warning came too late. Tom's horse snorted furiously, as if expelling a new and hateful scent, and, rearing high, he came down and plunged so violently that Tom flew one way and his gun another.

Tom landed hard and rooted his face in the grass. The shock stunned him for a second. Then he sat up and found himself unhurt. The surprise, the complete victory of the horse, and the humiliation of being made to root the ground like a pig stirred Tom to some heat.

"Hope you ain't hurt?" sailed Burn, anxiously, rising from his work.

"No, but I'm mad," replied Tom.

Whereupon Burn fell back and rolled over in the grass, roaring with mirth. Tom paid no attention to his comrade. Dusty had run off a hundred or more paces, and was now walking, head to one side, dragging his bridle. Tom yelled to stop him. Dusty kept on. Whereupon Tom broke into a run and caught him.

"You're a fine horse," panted Tom, as he mounted. "Now you'll--go back--and rub your nose--on that buffalo."

Dusty appeared placable enough, and trotted back readily until once again close to the buffalo. Tom spurred him on and called forcibly to him. Dusty grew excited as he came nearer. Still he did not show any ugliness.

"Don't hurry him," remonstrated Burn. "He's just scared."

But Tom, not yet cooled in temper, meant that Dusty should go right up to the buffalo. This he forced the horse to do. Then suddenly Dusty flashed down his head and seemed to propel himself with incredible violence high into the air. He came down on stiff legs. The shock was so severe that Tom shot out of the saddle. He came down back of the cantle. Desperately he clung to the pommel, and as Dusty pitched high again, his hold broke and he spun round like a top on the rump of the horse and slid off. Dusty ceased his pitching and backed away from the dead buffalo.

Only Tom's feelings were hurt. Burn Hudnall's "Haw! haw! haw!" rolled out in great volume. Tom sat where he had been dumped, and gazing at the horse, he gradually induced a state of mind bordering upon appreciation of how Dusty must have felt. Presently Burn got up, and catching Dusty, led him slowly and gently, talking soothingly the while, nearer to the buffalo, and held him there.

"He's all right now," said Burn.

Tom rose and went back to the horse and patted him.

"You bucked me off, didn't you?"

"Tom, if I were you I'd get off an' lead him up to the dead buffalo till he gets over his scare," suggested Burn.

"I will," replied Tom, and then he gazed down at the shaggy carcass on the ground. "Phew! the size of him!"

"Looks big as a woolly elephant, doesn't he? Big bull," Pilchuck said. "He's the only one I got, an' sure he took a lot of shootin'. You see the buffalo was runnin' an' I couldn't seem to hit one of them. Finally I plunked this bull. An' he kept on runnin' till I filled him full of lead."

"Where are those Pilchuck got?" queried Tom, anxious to go to work.

"First one's lyin' about a quarter--there, to the left a little. You go tackle skinnin' him. It's an old bull like this. An' if you get his skin off to-day I'll eat it."

"I've skinned lots of cattle--steers and bulls," replied Tom. "It wasn't hard work. Why should this be?"

"Man, they're buffalo, an' their skin's an inch thick, tougher than sole leather--an' stick! Why it's riveted on an' clinched."

"Must be some knack about the job, then," rejoined Tom, mounting Dusty. "Say, I nearly forgot my gun. Hand it up, will you? . . . Burn, I'll bet you I skin ten buffalo before dark and peg them out, as Pilchuck called it, before I go to bed."

"I'll take you up," said Burn, with a grim laugh. "I just wish I had time to watch you. It'd be a circus. But I'll be ridin' by you presently."

"All right. I'm off to win that bet," replied Tom, in cheery determination, and touching Dusty with the spurs he rode rapidly toward the next fallen buffalo.

CHAPTER IV

Dusty evinced less fear of the second prostrate buffalo, which was even a larger bull than the huge tough old animal Burn was engaged in skinning.

This time Tom did not take any needless risks with Dusty. Riding to within fifty feet of the dead beast, he dismounted, led the nervous horse closer, and round and round, and finally up to it. Dusty behaved very well, considering his first performance; left to himself, however, he edged away to a considerable distance and began to graze.

Tom lost no time in getting to work. He laid his gun near at hand, and divesting himself of his coat he took ripping and skinning knives from his belt. Determination was strong in him. He anticipated an arduous and perplexing job, yet felt fully capable of accomplishing it and winning his bet with Burn. This buffalo was a monster; he was old and the burrs and matted hair appeared a foot deep at his forequarters; he was almost black.

First Tom attempted to turn the beast over into a more favorable position for skinning. He found, however, that he could scarcely budge the enormous bulk. That was a surprise. There appeared nothing to do but go to work as best he could, and wait for help to move the animal. Forthwith he grasped his ripping knife and proceeded to try following instructions given him. It took three attempts to get the knife under the skin and when he essayed to rip he found that a good deal of strength was required. He had calculated that he must expend considerable energy to make any speed, until practice had rendered him proficient. The considerable energy grew into the utmost he could put forth. After the ripping came the skinning, and in very short time he appreciated all Burn had said. "Helluva job is right!" Tom commented, remembering his comrade's words. But he did not spare himself, and by tremendous exertions he had the buffalo skinned before Burn finished his. Tom could not vouch for the merit of the job, but the skin was off. He could vouch, however, for his breathlessness and the hot sweat that bathed his body. Plowing corn or pitching wheat, jobs he had imagined were hard work, paled into insignificance.

"Say--wonder what pegging out the hide--will be like," he panted, as he sheathed his knives and picked up his gun. Mounting Dusty he rode eastward, scanning the plain for the next dead buffalo.

Presently he espied it, and galloping thither he found it to be another bull, smaller and younger than the others, and he set to work with renewed zeal. He would have to work like a beaver to win that bet. It took violence to make a quick job of this one. That done, Tom rode on to the third.

While he was laboring here Burn rode by and paid him a hearty compliment, which acted upon Tom like a spur. He could not put forth any greater zeal; indeed, he would do wonders if he kept to the pace he had set himself. But as he progressed he learned. This advantage, however, was offset by the gradual dulling of his knives. He had forgotten to bring his steel.

He toiled from one dead buffalo to another. The breeze died away, the sun climbed high and blazed down upon the plain. His greatest need was water to drink. Hour by hour his thirst augmented. His shirt was so wet with perspiration that he could have wrung it out. The heat did not bother him so much. Gradually his clothes became covered with a lather of sweat, blood, grease, and dust. This, and the growing pangs in his body, especially hands and forearms, occasioned him extreme annoyance. He did not note the passing of time. Only now and then did he scan the plain for sign of his comrades. Indians he had completely forgotten. Burn and Stronghurl were to be seen at intervals, and Pilchuck, driving the wagon, was with them. Once from a high knoll Tom thought he espied another wagon miles down the river, but he could not be sure. He did, however, make out a dim black blur to the southward, and this he decided was the buffalo herd, ranging back toward the river.

During this strenuous time there were incidents of much interest, if he could only have given them due attention. Buzzards swooped down over him, closer and closer, till he felt the wind of their wings. A lean gray wolf came within range of his gun, but Tom had no time for shooting. He toiled on and the hours flew.

When, late in the afternoon, he tore off the hide that assured him of winning the wager, he was exultant. He was now two miles from the wagon, which he made out was approaching. Only one more buffalo did he find, and this he skinned by the time Pilchuck drove up.

"Wal, if you ain't a Kansas cyclone!" ejaculated the scout, with undisguised admiration. "Seventeen skinned your first day! Doan, I never seen the beat of it."

"I had a bet with Burn," replied Torn, wiping his hot face.

"If you can keep that lick up, young man, you'll make a stake out of this hide-huntin'," returned Pilchuck, seriously.

"Wait till I learn how!" exclaimed Tom, fired by the praise and the hopes thus engendered.

"Reckon I'll cut the hump off this young bull," remarked the scout, as he climbed out of the seat. "Buffalo steak for supper, hey?"

"I could eat hoofs. And I'm spitting cotton," said Tom.

"You forgot a canteen. Son, you mustn't forget anythin' in this game," admonished Pilchuck. "Rustle back to camp."

Tom was interested, however, to learn how Pilchuck would cut the desirable hump from the carcass. Long had Tom heard of the savory steaks from the buffalo. The scout thrust his big knife in near the joining of the loin, ripped forward along the lower side as far as the ribs ran; then performed a like operation on the upper side. That done, he cut the ends loose and carved out a strip over three feet long and so thick it was heavy.

"Reckon we can rustle back to camp now," he said, throwing the meat on the pile of hides in the wagon.

"Is that the herd coming back?" queried Tom, pointing from his horse.

"Yes. They'll be in to-night yet to drink. We'll find them here to-morrow mornin'. Did you hear the big fifties of the other hunters?"

"You mean others besides our outfit? No, I didn't."

"There's a couple of outfits down the river. But that's lucky for us. Probably will be hunters all along here soon. Reckon there's safety in numbers an' sure the buffalo are plenty enough."

Tom rode back to camp facing a sunset that emblazoned the western ramparts in gold and purple. The horizon line was far distant and lifted high, a long level upland, at that moment singularly wild and beautiful. Tom wondered if it could be the eastern extension of the great Staked Plains he had heard mentioned so often. Weary as he was from his extraordinary exertions, he yet had spirit left to look and feel and think. The future seemed like that gold-rimmed horizon line.

He reached camp before dusk, there to receive the plaudits of his comrades and also the women folks. Burn was generous in his eulogy, but he created consternation in Tom's breast by concluding, "Wait till you try peggin' out a hide!"

"Aw! I forgot there was more. I've not won that bet yet," he rejoined, dejectedly.

After attending to his horse Tom had just about enough energy left to drink copiously and stretch out with a groan under a tree. Never before in his life had he throbbed and ached and burned so exceedingly. An hour's rest considerably relieved him. Then supper, which he attacked somewhat as if he were a hungry wolf, was an event to be remembered. If all his comrades had not been equally as ravenous he would have been ashamed. Pilchuck got much satisfaction out of the rapid disappearance of many buffalo steaks.

"Meat's no good when so fresh," he averred. "After bein' hung up a few days an' set, we call it, an' fried in tallow, it beats beef all hollow."

Before darkness set in Tom saw Pilchuck peg out a hide. First the scout laid the hide flat and proceeded to cut little holes in it all around the edge. Next with ax and knife he sharpened sticks nearly a foot long. Three of these he drove through the neck of the hide and deep enough into the ground to hold well. Then he proceeded to the tail end and stretched the skin. Tom could well see that skill was required here. Pilchuck held the skin stretched, and at the same time drove one peg, then another, at this end. Following that, he began to stretch and peg the side, eventually working all around. The whole operation did not take long and did not appear difficult.

Tom essayed it with a vim that made up for misgivings. Like the skinning, it was vastly more difficult than it looked. Cutting the holes and making the pegs was easy; however, when it came to stretching the hide and holding it and pegging it all by himself, he found it a most deceiving and irksome task.

Sally Hudnall offered to help Tom, but he declined with thanks, explaining that he had a wager to win. The girl hovered round Tom and curiously watched him, much to his annoyance. He saw that she was laughing at him.

"What's so funny?" he queried, nettled.

"You look like a boy tryin' to play mumbly-peg an' leap-frog at once," she replied with a giggle.

Tom had to laugh a good-natured acknowledgment to that; and then he deftly turned the tables on her by making a dry, casual remark about Stronghurl. The girl blushed and let him alone to ponder over the intricacies of this hide pegging. No contortionist ever performed more marvels of stretching his body than Tom achieved. Likewise, no man ever so valiantly stifled back speech that would have been unseemly, to say the least, in the hearing of women. His efforts, however, were crowned with the reward of persistence. By midnight he had the job done, and utterly spent he crawled into his bed, where at once his eyes seemed to glue shut.

Next morning he readily answered Pilchuck's call, but his body was incapable of a like alacrity. He crawled out of his blankets as if he were crippled. A gradual working of his muscles, however, loosened the stiffness and warmed the cold soreness to the extent that he believed he could begin the day with some semblance of service.

It was again, in Pilchuck's terse terms, every man for himself. Tom welcomed this for two reasons, first that he could go easy, and secondly that he wanted to revel in and prolong his first real encounter with the buffalo.

Hudnall changed Tom's plans somewhat by relegating him to watch camp that day, while he went out with the other men. He modified this order, however, by saying that if any buffalo came near camp Tom might go after them.

Breakfast was over at sunrise. Pilchuck brought out his heavy ammunition box, with which each hunter was provided, and told Tom he could help a little and learn while he helped. His belt contained more than thirty empty shells that were to be reloaded.

"Reckon I ought to have done this last night," he explained to Hundall, who was impatient to be off. "You fellows go on down the river. I'll catch up with you."

The three hunters rode off eagerly, and Pilchuck got out his tools for reloading. Tom quickly learned the use of bullet-mold, swedge, lubricator, primer, extractor, tamper, and patch-paper.

"Reckon I'm all set now," affirmed the scout. "You put these tools away for me. An' keep a good lookout. I'm not worryin', but I'd like to know if there's Indians huntin' this herd. Take a look from the ridge with my glass, an' there'll be buffalo on the other side of the river to-day, you can keep in sight of camp an' get a shot."

With that Pilchuck mounted his horse and trotted away through the timber. Tom leisurely set about the few tasks at hand. It pleased him when he was able to avoid Sally's watching eyes. She seemed to regard him with something of disapproval. When the camp chores were finished Tom took the telescope and climbed to the ridge-top. Apparently more buffalo were in sight than on the previous day and about in the same latitude. Tom swept the circle of surrounding country, gray-green rolling plain, the low ridges, the winding river depression, with its fringe of trees. Some miles down the river rose a column of smoke, marking, no doubt, another camp. Far away to the south and west loomed the strange upheaval of land. Clearly defined by the telescope, it appeared to be an escarpment of horizon-wide dimensions, gray and barren, seamed by canyons, standing in wild and rugged prominence above the plains.

Not until late in the morning did Tom's watchful gaze espy buffalo approaching camp. Then he was thrilled to see a number of what appeared to be bulls grazing riverward opposite the camp. Hurrying down from the eminence whence he had made this observation, he got his gun and cartridges, and crossing the river he proceeded up the thickly wooded slope some distance to the west of his first stand of yesterday. It looked to him as if the bulls might work down into a coulee which opened into the river depression. He was quite a little time reaching the point desired--the edge of woodland and brink of the ravine--and when he peered from under the last trees he was moved with such an overwhelming excitement that he dropped to his knees.

Out on the open plain, not a hundred yards distant, grazed nine buffalo bulls, the leader of which appeared larger than the largest he had skinned the day before. They had not scented Tom and were grazing toward him, somewhat to the right, manifestly headed for the coulee.

Trembling and panting, Tom watched with strained sight. He forgot he held a "big fifty" in his hands, and in the riotous sensation of that moment he did not remember until from far down the river came a dull boom--boom of guns. It amazed him to see that the buffalo bulls paid no attention to the shooting. He made up his mind then to take his time and await a favorable opportunity to down the leader. They were approaching so slowly that he had ample time to control the trembling of his muscles, though it was impossible to compose himself.

Several of the bulls piled over the little bank into the coulee, and while they were passing within fifty yards of Tom the others leisurely began the descent, the huge bull nodding along in the rear. The near ones passed into the timber, getting farther away from Tom. He had difficulty in restraining his eagerness. Then one bull began to crash in the brush. He made as much noise as an elephant. Tom watched with an intense interest only second to the hot-pressed lust to kill. This bull was crashing against thick brush, and it soon became plain to Tom that the beast was scratching his shaggy hide, tearing out the matts of burrs and the shedding hair. It came away in great tufts, hanging on the sharp broken ends of the brush. This old bull knew what he was about when he charged that thicket of hackberry.

Suddenly Tom was electrified by a puff which assuredly came from the nostrils of a buffalo close to him. He turned cautiously. Behind and below him, closer than fifty yards, the other bulls were passing into the timber. He plainly heard the grinding of their teeth. They were monsters. Instinctively Tom searched for a tree to climb or a place to run to after he fired. What if they should charge his way? He would scarcely have time to reload, and even if he had, of what avail would that be?

Then the monarch wagged his enormous head in line with Tom's magnifying vision. What a wide short face! His eyes stood out so that he could see in front or behind. His shaggy beard was dragging. Tom could see only the tips of the horns in all that woolly mass. Puff! came the sound of expelled breath.

Tom felt he hated to kill that glorious and terrifying beast, yet he was powerless to resist the tight palpitating feverish dominance of his blood. Resting the heavy rifle on a branch, he aimed behind the great shaggy shoulder, and with strained muscles and bated breath he fired.

Like a cannon the old Sharps roared. Crashings of brush, thudding of heavy hoofs, sounded to the right of the cloud of smoke. The other bulls were running. Tom caught glimpses of broad brown backs cleaving the brush down the river slope. With shaking hands he reloaded. Peering under the drifting smoke, he searched fearfully for the bull he had fired at, at first seeing only the thick-grassed swelling slope of the coulee. Then farther down he espied a huge brown object lying inert.

The wildness of the boy in Tom conquered all else. Leaping up, he broke out of the woods, yelling like an Indian, and charged down the gentle slope, exultant and proud, yet not quite frenzied enough to forget possible peril. From that quarter, however, he was safe. The monarch was heaving his last breath.

Pilchuck rode in at noon that day, in time to see Tom stretch the hide of his first buffalo.

"You got one, hey?" he called, eying the great shaggy hide with appreciation. "Your first buffalo! Wal, it's a darned fine one. They don't come any bigger than that fellow."

Tom had to tell the story of his exploit, and was somewhat discomfited by the scout's remark that he should have killed several of the bulls.

"Aren't you back early?" queried Tom, as Pilchuck dismounted.

"Run out of cartridges," he said, laconically.

"So quick!" exclaimed Tom, staring. "You must have seen a lot of buffalo."

"Reckon they was thick this mornin'," returned the scout, dryly. "I got plumb surrounded once an' had to shoot my way out."

"Well! . . . How many did you down?"

"Twenty-one. I think when we count up tonight we'll have a good day. Burn is doin' better than yesterday. . . . Wal, I want a bite to eat an' a drink. It's warm ridin' in the dust. Then I'll hitch up the wagon an' drive down for the hides. Come to think of it, though, I've a job to do before. You can help me."

Later Pilchuck hailed Tom to fetch an ax and come on. Tom followed the scout down into the thickets.

"Cut four strong poles about ten feet long an' pack them to camp," said Pilchuck.

Tom did as he was bidden, to find that the scout had returned ahead of him, carrying four short poles with forks at one end. He proceeded to pound these into the ground with the forks uppermost, and then he laid across them the poles Tom had brought, making a square framework. "We'll stretch a hide inside the poles, loose so it'll sag down, an' there we'll salt our buffalo humps."

Pilchuck then brought in a team of horses and hitched it to the big wagon. "Wal, son," he said to Tom, "I ain't hankerin' after skinnin' hides. But I may as well start. We're goin' to kill more buffalo than we'll have time to skin."

He drove out of camp down the slope into the shallow water. The horses plunged in at a trot, splashing high. Pilchuck lashed out with the long whip and yelled lustily. Any slowing up there meant wheels stuck in the sand. Horses, driver, and wagon were drenched. From the other side Pilchuck looked back. "Fine on a day like this," he shouted.

Not long after he had gone Tom heard one of the horses up the river neigh several times. This induced him to reconnoiter, with the result that he espied a wagon coming along the edge of the timber. It appeared to be an open wagon, with one man in the driver's seat. Another, following on horseback, was leading two extra horses.

"More hide-hunters," Tom decided as he headed toward them. "Now I wonder what's expected of me in a case like this."

When the driver espied Tom come into the open, rifle in hand, he halted the horses abruptly.

"Dunn outfit--hide-hunters," he announced, with something of alarmed alacrity, as if his identity and business had been questioned. He appeared to be a short, broad man, and what little of his face was visible was bright red. He had bushy whiskers.

"I'm Tom Doan, of Hudnall's outfit," replied Tom. "We're camped just below."

"Clark Hudnall! By all that's lucky!" exclaimed the man. "I know Hudnall. We talked some last fall of going in together. That was at Independence. But he wasn't ready and I come ahead."

Tom offered his hand, and at this juncture the horseman that had been behind the wagon rode forward abreast of the driver. He was a fat young man with a most jocund expression on his round face. His apparel was striking in its inappropriateness to the rough life of the plains. His old slouch hat was too small for his large head, and there was a tuft of tow-colored hair sticking out of a hole in the crown.

"Ory, shake hands with Tom Doan, of Hudnall's outfit," said Dunn. "My nephew, Ory Tacks."

"Much obliged to meet you, Mister Doan," replied Tacks, with great aplomb.

"Howdy! Same to you," greeted Tom, in slow, good humor, as he studied the face of this newcomer.

Dunn interrupted his scrutiny.

"Is Hudnall in camp?"

"No. He's out hunting buffalo. I'm sure you're welcome to stop at our camp till he comes in. That'll be around sundown."

"Good. I'm needing sight and sound of some one I know," replied Dunn, significantly. "Lead the way, Doan. These horses of mine are thirsty."

When the travelers arrived at Hudnall's camp, Tom helped them unhitch in a favorable camping spot, and unpack the necessary camp duffle. Once during this work Ory Tacks halted so suddenly that he dropped a pack on his foot.

"Ouch!" he cried, lifting his foot to rub it with his hand while he kept his gaze toward Tom's camp. It was an enraptured and amazed gaze. "Do I see a beautiful young lady?"

Thus questioned, Tom wheeled to see Sally Hudnall's face framed in the white-walled door of Hudnall's prairie wagon. It was rather too far to judge accurately, but he inclined to the impression that Sally was already making eyes at Ory Tacks.

"Oh! There!" ejaculated Tom, hard put to it to keep his face serious. "It's a young lady, all right--Miss Sally Hudnall. But I can't see that she--"

"Uncle Jack, there's a girl in this camp," interrupted Ory, in tones of awe.

"We've got three women," said Tom.

"Well, that's a surprise to us," returned Dunn. "I had no idea Hudnall would fetch his women folks down here into the buffalo country. I wonder if he . . . Tom, is there a buffalo-hunter with you, a man who knows the frontier?"

"Yes. Jude Pilchuck."

"Did he stand for the women coming?"

"I guess he had no choice," rejoined Tom.

"Humph! How long have you been on the river?"

"Two days."

"Seen any other outfits?"

"No. But Pilchuck said there were a couple down the river."

"Awhuh," said Dunn, running a stubby, powerful hand through his beard. He seemed concerned. "You see, Doan, we've been in the buffalo country since last fall. And we've sure had it rough. Poor luck on our fall hunt. That was over on the Brazos. Kiowa Indians on the rampage. Our winter hunt we made on the line of Indian Territory. We didn't know it was against the law to kill buffalo in the Territory. The officers took our hides. Then we'd got our spring hunt started fine--west of here forty miles or so. Had five hundred hides. And they were stolen."

"You don't say!" exclaimed Tom, astonished. "Who'd be so low down as to steal hides?"

"Who?" snorted Dunn, with fire in his small eyes. "We don't know. The soldiers don't know. They say the thieves are Indians. But I'm one who believes they are white."

Tom immediately grasped the serious nature of this information. The difficulties and dangers of hide-hunting began to assume large proportions.

"Well, you must tell Hudnall and Pilchuck all about this," he said.

Just then Sally called out sweetly, "Tom--oh, Tom--wouldn't your visitors like a bite to eat?"

"Reckon they would, miss, thanks to you," shouted Dunn, answering for himself. As for Ory Tacks, he appeared overcome, either by the immediate prospect of food, or by going into the presence of the beautiful young lady. Tom noted that he at once dropped his task of helping Dunn and bent eager energies to the improvement of his personal appearance. Dunn and Tom had seated themselves before Ory joined them, but when he did come he was manifestly bent on making a great impression.

"Miss Hudnall--my nephew, Ory Tacks," announced Dunn, with quaint formality.

"What's the name?" queried Sally, incredulously, as if she had not heard aright.

"Orville Tacks--at your service, Miss Hudnall," replied the young man, elaborately. "I am much obliged to meet you."

Sally took him in with keen, doubtful gaze, and evidently, when she could convince herself that he was not making fun at her expense, gravitated to a perception of easy conquest. Tom saw that this was a paramount issue with Sally. Probably later she might awake to a humorous appreciation of this young gentleman.

Tom soon left the newcomers to their camp tasks, and went about his own, which for the most part consisted of an alert watchfulness. Early in the afternoon the distant boom-boom of the big buffalo guns ceased to break the drowsy silence. The hours wore away. When, at time of sunset, Tom returned from his last survey of the plains, it was to find Hudnall and his hunter comrades in camp. Pilchuck was on the way back with a load of fifty-six hides. Just as twilight fell he called from the opposite bank that he would need help at the steep place. All hands pulled and hauled the wagon over the obstacle; and hard upon that incident came Mrs. Hudnall's cheery call to supper.

Tom watched and listened with more than his usual attentiveness. Hudnall was radiant. This day's work had been good. For a man of his tremendous strength and endurance the extreme of toil was no hindrance. He was like one that had found a gold mine. Burn Hudnall reflected his father's spirit. Pilchuck ate in silence, not affected by their undisguised elation. Stronghurl would have been dense indeed, in the face of Sally's overtures, not to sense a rival in Ory Tacks. This individual almost ate out of Sally's hand. Dunn presented a rather gloomy front. Manifestly he had not yet told Hudnall of his misfortunes.

After supper it took the men two hours of labor to peg out the hides. All the available space in the grove was blanketed with buffalo skins, with narrow lanes between. Before this work was accomplished the women had gone to bed. At the camp fire which Tom replenished, Dunn recounted to Hudnall and Pilchuck the same news he had told Tom, except that he omitted comment on the presence of the women.

To Tom's surprise, Hudnall took Dunn's story lightly. He did not appear to grasp any serious menace, and he dismissed Dunn's loss with brief words: "Hard luck! But you can make it up soon. Throw in with me. The more the merrier, an' the stronger we'll be."

"How about your supplies?" queried Dunn.

"Plenty for two months. An' we'll be freightin' out hides before that."

"All right, Clark, I'll throw in with your outfit huntin' for myself, of course, an' payin' my share," replied Dunn, slowly, as if the matter was weighty. "But I hope you don't mind my talkin' out straight about your women."

"No, you can talk straight about anyone or anythin' to me."

"You want to send your women back or take them to Fort Elliott," returned Dunn, brusquely.

"Dunn, I won't do anythin' of the kind," retorted Hudnall, bluntly.

"Well, the soldiers will do it for you, if they happen to come along," said Dunn, just as bluntly. "It's your own business. I'm not trying to interfere in your affairs. But women don't belong on such a huntin' trip as this summer will see. My idea, talking straight, is that Mr. Pilchuck here should have warned you and made you leave the women back in the settlement."

"Wal, I gave Hudnall a hunch all right, but he wouldn't listen," declared the scout.

"You didn't give me any such damn thing," shouted Hudnall angrily.

Then followed a hot argument that in Tom's opinion ended in the conviction that Pilchuck had not told all he knew.

"Well, if that's what, I reckon it doesn't make any difference to me," said Hudnall, finally. "I wanted wife an' Sally with me. An' if I was comin' at all they were comin' too. We're huntin' buffalo, yes, for a while--as long as there's money in it. But what we're huntin' most is a farm."

"Now, Hudnall, listen," responded Dunn, curtly. "I'm not tryin' to boss your outfit. After this I'll have no more to say. . . . I've been six months at this hide-huntin' an' I know what I'm talkin' about. The great massed herd of buffalo is south of here, on the Red River, along under the rim of the Staked Plain. You think this herd here is big. Say, this is a straggler bunch. There's a thousand times as many buffalo down on the Red. . . . There's where the most of the hide-hunters are and there the Comanches and Kiowas are on the war-path. I've met hunters who claim this main herd will reach here this spring, along in May. But I say that great herd will never again get this far north. If you want hide-huntin' for big money, then you've got to pull stakes for the Red River."

"By thunder! we'll pull then," boomed Hudnall.

"Reckon we've got some good huntin' here, as long as this bunch hangs around the water," interposed Pilchuck. "We've got it 'most all to ourselves."

"That's sense," said Dunn, conclusively. "I'll be glad to stay. But when we do pull for the Staked Plain country you want to look for some wild times. There'll be hell along the Red River this summer."

In the swiftly flying days that succeeded Dunn's joining Hudnall's outfit Tom developed rapidly into a hunter and skinner of buffalo. He was never an expert shot with the heavy Sharps, but he made up in horsemanship and daring what he lacked as a marksman. If a man had nerve he did not need to be skillful with the rifle. It was as a skinner, however, that Tom excelled all of Hudnall's men. Tom had been a wonderful husker of corn; he had been something of a blacksmith. His hands were large and powerful, and these qualifications, combined with deftness, bade fair to make him a record skinner.

The Hudnall outfit followed the other outfits, which they never caught up with, south along the stream in the rear of this herd of buffalo. Neither Dunn nor Pilchuck knew for certain that the stream flowed into the Red River, but as the days grew into weeks they inclined more and more to that opinion. If it was so, luck was merely with them. Slowly the herd gave way, running, when hunted, some miles to the south, and next day always grazing east to the river. The morning came, however, when the herd did not appear. Pilchuck rode thirty miles south without success. He was of the opinion, and Dunn agreed with him, that the buffalo had at last made for the Red River. So that night plan was made to abandon hunting for the present and to travel south in search of the main herd.

Tom took stock of his achievements, and was exceedingly amazed and exultant. How quickly it seemed that small figures augmented to larger ones!

He had hunted, in all, twenty-four days. Three hundred and sixty buffalo had fallen to his credit. But that was not all. It was the skinning which he was paid for, and he had skinned four hundred and eighty-two buffalo--an average of twenty a day. Hudnall owed him then one hundred forty-four dollars and sixty cents. Tom had cheerfully and gratefully worked on a farm for twenty dollars a month. This piling up of money was incredible. He was dazzled. Suppose he hunted and skinned buffalo for a whole year! The prospect quite overwhelmed him. Moreover, the camp life, the open wilderness, the hard riding and the thrill of the chase--these had worked on him insensibly, until before he realized it he was changed.

CHAPTER V

There was just daylight enough to discern objects when Milly Fayre peeped out of the wagon, hoping against hope that she would be able to wave a farewell to the young man, Tom Doan. She knew his name and the names of all the Hudnall party. For some reason her stepfather was immensely curious about other outfits, yet avoided all possible contact with them.

But no one in Hudnall's camp appeared to be stirring. The obscurity of the gray dawn soon swallowed the grove of trees and the prairie schooners. Milly lay back in her bed in the bottom of the wagon and closed her eyes. Sleep would not come again. The rattle of wagon trappings, the roll of the crunching wheels, and the trotting clip-clop of hoofs not only prevented slumber, but also assured her that the dreaded journey down into the prairie had begun in reality.

This journey had only one pleasing prospect--and that was a hope, forlorn at best, of somewhere again seeing the tall, handsome stranger who had spoken so kindly to her and gazed at her with such thoughtful eyes.

Not that she hoped for anything beyond just seeing him! She would be grateful for that. Her stepfather would not permit any friendships, let alone acquaintances, with buffalo-hunters. Five weeks with this stepfather had taught her much, and she feared him. Last night his insulting speech before Tom Doan had created in Milly the nucleus of a revolt. She dared to imagine a time might come, in another year when she became of age, that would give her freedom.

The meeting with Tom Doan last night had occasioned, all in twelve hours, a change in Milly Fayre. His look had haunted her, and even in the kindly darkness it had power to bring the blood to her face. Then his words so full of fear and reproach--"I may never see you again!"--they had awakened Milly's heart. No matter what had inspired them! Yet she could harbor no doubt of this fine-spoken, clear-eyed young man. He was earnest. He meant that not to see her again would cause him regret. What would it mean to her--never to see him again? She could not tell. But seeing him once had lightened her burden.

So in Milly Fayre there was born a dream. Hard work on a farm had been her portion--hard work in addition to the long journey to and from school. She did not remember her father, who had been one of the missing in the war. It had been a tragedy, when she was sixteen, for her mother to marry Randall Jett, and then live only a few months. Milly had no relatives. Boys and men had tormented her with their advances, and their importunities, like the life she had been forced to lead, had not brought any brightness. Relief indeed had been hers during those months when her stepfather had been absent hunting buffalo. But in March he had returned with another wife, a woman hard featured and coarse and unreasonably jealous of Milly. He had sold the little Missouri farm and brought his wife and Milly south, inflamed by his prospects of gaining riches in the buffalo fields.

From the start Milly had dreaded that journey. But she could not resist. She was in Randall Jett's charge. Besides, she had nowhere to go; she knew nothing except the work that fell to the lot of a daughter of the farm. She had been apathetic, given to broodings and a growing tendency toward morbidness. All the days of that traveling southward had been alike, until there came the one on which her kindness to a horse had brought her face to face with Tom Doan. What was it that had made him different? Had the meeting been only last night?

The wagon rolled on down the uneven road, and the sudden lighting of the canvas indicated that the sun had risen. Milly heard the rattling of the harness on the horses. One of the wagons, that one driven by Jett, was close behind.

Movement and sound of travel became more bearable as Milly pondered over the difference one day had wrought. It was better that she was going on the road of the hide-hunters, for Tom Doan was one of them. Every thought augmented something vague and deep that baffled her. One moment she would dream of yesterday--that incident of casual meeting, suddenly to become one of strangely locked eyes--how all day she had watched Hudnall's camp for sight of the tall young man--how she had listened to Jett's gossip with his men about the other outfits--how thrilled she had been when she had met Tom Doan again. It had not been altogether fear of her stepfather that had made her run off from this outspoken, keen-eyed young man. She had been suddenly beset by unfamiliar emotions. The touch of his hands--his look--his speech! Milly felt again the uplift of her heart, the swell of breast, the tingling race of blood, the swift, vague, fearful thoughts.

The next moment Milly would try to drive away the sweet insidious musing, to ponder over her presence there in this rattling wagon, and what might be in store for her. There had been a break in the complexity of her situation. Something, a new spirit, seemed stirring in her. If she was glad of anything it was for the hours in which she could think. This canvas-topped wagon was her house of one room, and when she was inside, with the openings laced, she felt the solitude her soul needed. For one thing, Jett never objected to her seeking the privacy of her abode; and she now, with her new-born intuition, sensed that it was because he did not like to see the men watching her. Yet he watched her himself with his big hard blue eyes. Tom Doan's eyes had not been like that. She could think of them and imagine them, so kindly piercing and appealing.

This drifting from conjectures and broodings into a vague sort of enchanting reverie was a novel experience for Milly. She resisted a while, then yielded to it. Happiness abided therein. She must cultivate such easy means of forgetting the actual.

Milly's wagon lumbered on over the uneven road, and just when she imagined she could no longer stand the jolting and confinement, it halted.

She heard Jett's gruff voice, the scrape of the brakes on the wagon behind, and then the unsnapping of harness buckles and the clinking thud of heavy cooking-ware thrown to the ground. Milly opened the canvas slit at the back of her wagon, and taking up the bag that contained her mirror, brush and comb, soap, towel, and other necessities, she spread the flaps of the door and stepped down to the ground.

Halt had been made at the edge of a clump of trees in a dry arroyo. It was hot, and Milly decided she would put on her sunbonnet as soon as she had washed her face and combed her hair.

"Mawin', girl," drawled a lazy voice. It came from the man, Catlee, who had driven her wagon. He was a swarthy fellow of perhaps forty years, rugged of build, garbed as a teamster, with a lined face that seemed a record of violent life. Yet Milly had not instinctively shrunk from him as from the others.

"Good morning, Mr. Catlee," she responded. "Can I get some water?"

"Shore, miss. I'll hev it for you in a jiffy," he volunteered, and stepping up on the hub of a front wheel he rummaged under the seat, to fetch forth a basin. This he held under a keg that was wired to the side of the wagon.

"Dry camp, Catlee," spoke up a gruff voice from behind. "Go easy on the water."

"All right, boss, easy it is," he replied, as he twisted a peg out of the keg. He winked at Milly and deliberately let the water pour out until the basin was full. This he set on a box in the shade of the wagon. "Thar you are, miss."

Milly thanked him and proceeded leisurely about her ablutions. She knew there was a sharp eye upon her every move and was ready for the gruff voice when it called out: "Rustle, you Milly. Help here, an' never mind your good looks!"

Milly minded them so little that she scarcely looked at herself in the mirror; and when Jett reminded her of them, which he was always doing, she wished that she was ugly. Presently, donning the sunbonnet, which served the double duty of shading her eyes from the hot glare and hiding her face, she turned to help at the camp-fire tasks.

Mrs. Jett, Milly's stepmother, was on her knees before a panful of flour and water, which she was mixing into biscuit dough. The sun did not bother her, apparently, for she was bareheaded. She was a handsome woman, still young, dark, full faced, with regular features and an expression of sullenness.

Jett strode around the place, from wagon to fire, his hands quick and strong to perform two things at once. His eyes, too, with their hard blue light, roved everywhere. They were eyes of suspicion. This man was looking for untoward reactions in the people around him.

Everybody worked speedily, not with the good will of a camp party that was wholesome and happy, bent on an enterprise hopeful, even if dangerous, but as if dominated by a driving spirit. Very soon the meal was ready, and the men extended pan and cup for their portion, which was served by Mrs. Jett.

"Eat, girl," called Jett, peremptorily.

Milly was hungry enough, albeit she had been slow and, receiving her food and drink, she sat down upon a sack of grain. While she ate she watched from under the wide rim of her sun-bonnet.

Did she imagine a subtle change had come over these men, now that the journey toward the wild buffalo country had begun? Follonsbee had been with Jett before and evidently had the leader's confidence, as was evinced by the many whispered consultations Milly had observed. He was a tall, spare man, with evil face, red from liquor and exposure, and eyes that Milly had never looked into twice. Pruitt had lately joined the little caravan. Small of stature, though hardy, and with a sallow face remarkable in that its pointed chin was out of line with the bulging forehead, he presented an even more repulsive appearance than Follonsbee. He was a rebel and lost no opportunity to let that fact be known.

These men were buffalo-hunters, obsessed with the idea of large sums of money to be made from the sale of hides. From what little Milly had been able to learn, all the men except Catlee were to share equally in the proceeds of the hunt. Milly had several times heard argument to that effect--argument always discontinued when she came within hearing.

Milly had become curious about her stepfather and his men. This interest of hers dated back no farther than yesterday, when her meeting with Tom Doan, and a few words exchanged with the pleasant Mrs. Hudnall, and her eager watching of the Hudnall camp, had showed her plainly that Jett's was a different kind of outfit. No good humor, no kindliness, no gay words or pleasant laughs, no evidence of wholesome anticipation! Jett had never been a man she could care for, yet up to the last few weeks he had been endurable. The force of him had changed with the advent of these other men and the journey into unsettled country. In him Milly now began to sense something sinister.

They did not speak often. The business of eating and the hurry maintained by Jett were not altogether cause for this taciturnity. Catlee was the only one who occasionally made a casual remark, and then no one appeared to hear him.

"Rustle along, you-all," ordered Jett, gruffly, as he rose from his meal.

"Do you aim to camp at Wade's Crossin' tonight?" queried Follonsbee.

"No. We'll water an' get wood there, an' go on," returned Jett, briefly.

The other men made no comment, and presently they rose, to set about their tasks. The horses were hitched up while munching their grain out of the nose bags. Milly wiped the plates and utensils that Mrs. Jett hurriedly and silently washed.

"Mother, I--I wish we were not going on this hunt," ventured Milly, at last, for no other reason than that she could not stand the silence.

"I'm not your mother," replied the woman, tersely. "Call me Jane, if the name Mrs. Jett makes you jealous?"

"Jealous? Why should I be jealous of that name?" asked Milly, in slow surprise.

"You're no more related to Jett than I am," said Mrs. Jett, pondering darkly. She seemed a thick-minded person. "For my part, I don't like the hunt, either. I told Jett so, an' he said, 'Like it or lump it, you're goin'.' I reckon you'd better keep your mouth shut."

Milly did not need such admonition, so far as her stepfather was concerned. But from that moment she decided to keep both eyes and ears open. Jett's domineering way might be responsible for the discontent of his wife and the taciturnity of his men.

When all was in readiness to resume the journey Milly asked Jett if she could ride on the seat with the driver.

"Reckon not," answered Jett, as he clambered to his own seat.

"But my back gets tired. I can't lie down all the time," remonstrated Milly.

"Jane, you ride with Catlee an' let Milly come with me," said Jett.

"Like hob!" sneered his wife, with a sudden malignant flash of eyes that was a revelation to Milly. "Wouldn't you like that fine now, Rand Jett?"

"Shut up!" returned Jett, in mingled anger and discomfiture.

"You're mighty afraid some man will look at that girl," she went on, regardless of his gathering frown. "How's she ever goin' to get a husband?"

Jett glared at her and ground his teeth.

"Oh, I see," continued Mrs. Jett, without lowering her strident voice. "She ain't goin' to get a husband if you can help it. I've had that hunch before."

"Will you shut up?" shouted Jett, furiously.

Whereupon the woman lifted herself to the seat beside him. Jett started his team out toward the road. As Pruitt and Follonsbee had driven ahead in their wagon, Milly was left alone with Catlee, who seemed to be both amused and sympathetic.

"Climb up heah, miss," said he.

Milly hesitated, and then suddenly the new turn of her mind obstructed her old habit of obedience and she nimbly stepped to a seat beside the driver.

"Reckon it'll be warmer out heah in the sun, but there's a breeze an' you can see around," he said.

"It's much nicer."

Catlee plied his long lash, cracking it over the horses without touching them, and they moved off in easy trot. The road lay downhill, and ahead the gray prairie rolled in undulating vast stretches to the horizon.

"Are we going to Indian Territory?" Milly asked the driver.

"Miss, we're in the Territory now," he replied. "I don't know when, but in a few days we'll cross the line into the Panhandle of Texas."

"Is that where the buffalo are?"

"I ain't shore aboot that. I heard Jett say the big herd would be comin' north an' likely run into the hunters somewheres near Red River."

"Will all the hunters go to the same place?"

"Shore they will, an' that'll be where the buffalo are."

Milly did not analyze the vague hope that mounted in her breast. She felt surprised to find she wanted to talk, to learn things.

"Is this strange country to you?" she asked.

"Shore is, miss. I never was west of the Missouri till this trip. Reckon it's goin' to be hard. I met some hunters last night. They was celebratin' their arrival in town, an' I couldn't take too great stock in their talk. But shore they said it was bad down heah where we're goin'. I'm afraid it ain't no place for a girl like you."

"I'm afraid so, too," said Milly.

"Jett ain't your real father?" queried Catlee.

"He's my stepfather," replied Milly, and then in a few words she told Catlee about herself, from the time her mother had married Jett.

"Well, well, that accounts," rejoined Catlee, in tones unmistakably kind. But he did not vouchsafe to explain what he meant. Indeed, her simple story seemed to have silenced him. Yet more than before she felt his sympathy. It struck her singularly that he had stopped talking because he might have committed himself to some word against her stepfather.

Thereafter Milly kept the conversation from personalities, and during the afternoon ride she talked at intervals and then watched the dim horizon receding always with its beckoning mystery.

Sunset time found Jett's caravan descending a long gradual slope ending in a timbered strip that marked the course of a stream. Catlee pointed out two camps to Milly. White wagons stood out against the woodland; fires were twinkling; smoke was rising. The place appeared pleasant and sheltered. Jett drove across the stream, unhitched the horses, and he and Follonsbee watered them and filled the kegs while Pruitt and Catlee gathered firewood, which was tied on behind the wagons.

One of the campers below the crossing came out in the open to halloo at Jett, more in friendly salutation than otherwise. Jett did not reply. He lost no time hooking up traces and harness and getting under way. He led on until nearly dark and halted at a low place where grass appeared abundant.

"Why didn't my stepfather camp back there with the other outfits?" queried Milly, as Catlee halted his team.

"Shore he's not sociable, an' he's bent on travelin' as far every day as possible," replied the driver.

While Milly was busily engaged helping Mrs. Jett round the camp fire, darkness settled. Coyotes were yelping. A night wind rose and, sweeping down into the shallow coulee, it sent the white sparks flying. The morose mood of the travelers persisted. After supper was over and the tasks were finished Milly climbed to the seat of her wagon and sat there. It was out of earshot of the camp fire. Jett's wagon had been drawn up close beside the one she occupied. Heretofore camp had always been pitched in a sheltered place, in a grove or under the lea of a wooded hill. This site was out on the open prairie. The wind swept around and under the wagon, and it needed only a little more force to make it moan. But few stars lightened the cloudy sky. Lonesome, dismal, and forbidding, this prairie land increased Milly's apprehensions. She tried not to think of the future. Always before she had been dully resigned to a gray prospect. But now a consciousness grew that she could not go on forever like this, even if her situation did not grow worse. Of that, she had no doubt. Someone had told her that when she was eighteen years old she would be free to look out for herself. Yet even so, what could she do? She worked as hard for the Jetts as she would have to work for anyone else. Perhaps eventually she might get a place with a nice family like the Hudnalls. Suddenly the thought of Tom Doan flashed into her mind, and then of marriage. Her face burned. She hid it, fearful that even under cover of night someone might see her and read her thoughts. No use to try to repudiate them! She yearned for the companionship of women who would be kind to her, for a home, and for love.

These thoughts became torture for Milly, but only so long as she strove against them