“How do you find it Fred?” turning toward their younger companion.
“I can manage to worry down a little.”
“I should think you could!” was the indignant comment of the cook, as his friends swallowed the last mouthful.
The darkness slowly settled over prairie and mountain, and when the hunters had gorged themselves with meat, so rich and juicy that they could not conceal their delight, they wiped their greasy fingers upon their heads, produced their pipes, lay back and “enjoyed themselves.”
Although in the midst of a hostile country, all three were too experienced to feel any apprehension regarding their safety. This fire had been so skilfully kindled at the bottom of a hollow, so artfully, that a lynx-eyed Apache or Comanche might have stood within a hundred feet of them without suspecting its existence. Their horses, too, had been trained long enough in danger and peril to know the value of silence on a dark night and in a still country; and there was no fear of their discovery by hostile eyes through any indiscretion on their part.
From long exposure to danger, the hunters had acquired a habit of speaking in low tones, and frequently pausing and listening before making responses to a question. When they laughed, no matter how heartily, it was without noise, except out upon the broad prairie, when their cramped up lungs demanded freedom, and then their laugh rang out clear and loud, like the blast of a silver trumpet.
Even as they smoked, the coal in their pipes was invisible. They had a fashion unknown to us of more civilized regions, of sinking the coal or burning part of the pipe below the surface of the tobacco, by a few extra long whiffs, so that, as they leisurely drew upon them afterwards there was no fear of the red points betraying their presence, a thing which has more than once taken place in the early history of our country.
The party drew at their pipes in quiet enjoyment for some time, and then, as the night was pleasant and warm they fell into an easy conversation.
“I wonder whether we shall come upon the caravan tomorrow,” remarked Fred Wainwright, not because he imagined there was any thing particularly brilliant in the remark, but for the same reason that we frequently say a pointless thing—because we can’t think of something better.
“P’raps we shall, and p’raps we shant,” was the non-committal answer of Ward Lancaster.