“You can’t fool dis chile; I reasoned out de whole thing. Mr. Shagbark tole me how dem critters chaw and stomp and bite a feller; I knowed dat if I brunged down dis one, it would make de oder two so mad dey’d come at me afore I could load up ag’in, and you wouldn’t hab any Jeth any more. So I luft; dem antelopes am wery rewengeful—wery rewengeful—and I’se too smart to gib ’em de chance dey wanted to lambast me.”
CHAPTER XI
A DISAPPOINTMENT
No argument could be held with such intelligence as this. Shagbark, with a queer expression on his bearded countenance, looked at the grinning Jethro, but did not speak. Possibly he felt that he was blamable in the matter, for it had been his awful words that caused the senseless panic of the colored youth, and made him flee from before a harmless antelope, when the lad had a loaded rifle in his hands and knew how to use it.
Alden was so amazed that at first he suspected his dusky friend was jesting, but there could be no doubt of his earnestness. Jethro was confident that he had saved his life by his own brightness.
“It’s too much for me,” commented Alden with a shake of his head.
When all three were in their saddles, they rode out to where the two carcasses lay at the foot of the slope. Shagbark compelled Jethro to dismount and help sling the body of the buck across the back of the pony and balance in front of the saddle. Since the animal weighed nearly as much as the African himself, the veteran ordered him to walk beside his horse and hold the burden in place until the party reached camp. The female which had been shot was so much lighter that Shagbark took it on the back of his powerful steed with him. The burden was weighty, but the distance was not far, and all moved at a moderate walk.
At the moment of starting, the sun was shining from a clear sky. Ten minutes later the radiance turned a dull leaden hue, and all three were wrapped in the swirl of a furious snow squall. The millions of big flakes, eddied and spun around and so filled the air that they could not see one another, when they were barely ten feet apart. Shagbark called to the two to fall in line behind him and not stop. They bent their heads and pushed on, leaving the direction to the ponies.
Presto! the squall ended as quickly as it began. At the close of fifteen minutes not a flake was in the air. The ground was covered with a thin white sheet which speedily melted in the warm rays of the sun. The radius of the curious flurry was so slight that it was speedily left behind them.
Jethro led his pony alongside of Alden’s mare. The guide, as was his custom when riding with the emigrant train, kept a brief way in advance, looking straight ahead and paying no attention to the two behind him.