"Say, these glasses are jim-dandy ones, all right!" remarked Bob, presently, as he turned to offer them to his chum, who immediately clapped them to his own eyes.
"Huh!" grunted Frank a moment later, "squaws along; each cayuse dragging poles on which they heap their lodges, blankets and such; reckon there's no war party about that, Bob."
"I should think not, if what you've told me about the Indians is a fact, Frank. But look here, what d'ye suppose they're doing so far away from their reservation?" and Bob gripped his quirt, which hung, as usual, from his wrist, in cowboy fashion; and with a nervous slash cut off the tops of the rattlesnake weed within reach.
"That's where you've got me, Bob," replied the one who had been brought up on a ranch, and who was supposed to know considerable about the life of the plains; "unless they've just got desperate for a good old hunt, and broke loose. Pretty soon the pony soldiers will come galloping along, round 'em up, and chase the lot back to their quarters. Uncle Sam is kind, and winks at a heap; but he won't stand for the Injuns skipping out just when the notion takes 'em."
They sat there in their saddles a while longer, watching the long procession pass out beyond the low hill, and track along the plain through the scented purple sage.
"Navajos, ain't they?" asked Bob, who, of course, depended on his comrade for all such information, since one Indian was as much like another as two peas to him.
"Sure thing," replied the other, carelessly. "Tell 'em as far as I can glimpse the beggars. And I just reckon now that's old Wolf Killer himself, ridin' at the head of the line, with his gay blanket wrapped around him. Wonder what he'd say if he knew Frank Haywood was here, so far away from the home ranch?" and Frank chuckled as though amused.
"Do you know the old chief, then?" asked Bob.
"Say, do I?" replied Frank, with a laugh. "Remember me telling you how the boys on our place caught a Navajo trying to run away with one of our saddle herds about three years ago, when I was hardly more'n a kid? Well, I chased him with the rest of the outfit, and saw old Hank throw his rope over his shoulders. He snaked the fellow over the ground and through the short buffalo grass like a coyote, 'till he was punished enough; and then my dad made 'em let him go. But you just ought to have seen the way he folded his arms, stared at each of us, and, never saying a single word, walked away. I've often wondered if he didn't mean to come back some day, and try to get his revenge."
"And that was the chief himself?" asked Bob.