“Sart’in, I’d go my pile onto it, an’ I ain’t got much to go an’ can’t well aford to lose that little, but I’d bet high on it.”
“But I’m a poor man,” urged Dave.
“Jus’ so, but ’arter we get to Montana we’ll try the gold-diggin’s, an’ who knows we mought make a big strike thar. If the gal does love you, why she’ll wait a little while for you, an’ if she won’t wait, why she don’t love you an’ the quicker you forget her the better; that’s sense, now I tell you.”
“Well, Abe, I believe it is; I have not tried to make the girl love me, but I will try now, and if she does love me, that’s all I ask for in this world”—and the young guide’s face shone with a smile of happiness as he leaned upon his elbow and thought of the golden locks of the pretty Leona, to him the prettiest girl in all the world.
“You’re right, Dave,” said the “Crow-Killer,” thoughtfully, “a good woman’s love is a treasure in this world; years have gone by since I lost my little Injun wife, but I haven’t forgotten her. Thar’s a mystery about her death, for I suppose she was killed when the red-skins burnt my cabin, but I ain’t sure of it. She may be alive, even now, up in the Crow nation. One of these days I’m goin’ to take a party up thar an’ see if I can’t diskiver the truth. Thar’s something else, too, that I want to know; thar’s a sort of suspicion in my mind that thar’s a reason why I an’ the ‘White Vulture’ shouldn’t come together. I want to capture a Crow Injun, an old chief, one as old as myself, if I can, an’ if he’ll only speak the truth to me, he can tell me of some things connected with the Crow nation that I want to know.”
We will now leave the two guides and follow the Hickmans, father and son, as they walked toward the fort.
“That fellow Dave is not over civil,” said the son.
“No,” responded the father, “I don’t think that he bears either of us any great love.”
“I think I can guess the reason,” said Richard, with a sneer.
“That is not difficult to guess,” responded the father, a sneer also upon his lips. “The fellow has a fancy for Leona.”