“Easy, easy, now!” exclaimed Hi, gazing calculatingly. “Thar’s buffalo enough for all, I reckon. Must be two thousand. But if you try to run ’em down on foot we’ll lose every one. Let’s unharness the mules, fust.”
Left-over promptly jumped to help. The buffalo were plain in sight. To the right of the trail, slightly ahead and just out of gun-shot, they were grazing in a great herd which speckled the landscape like a mass of gooseberry bushes.
“Looks as if we had ’em all to ourselves,” quoth Jim, as the mules were speedily unharnessed from the wagon. “No ‘pilgrims’ around to interfere with this herd. Reckon if we don’t get a mess it will be our own fault.”
“Where do I come in?” whined Left-over, anxiously. “You promised me, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did, and I never break a promise. Hyar’s your gun, now. You stay right whar you are. We’ll drive the buffalo in to you. Otherwise you’ll jest shoot up the landscape and mebbe yourself or us in the bargain. Lend me one of your shooting-irons, Billy. The pistol’s enough. Thanks.”
So saying, he vaulted on one of the mules, Hi did the same. They rode bareback with the traces tied short, and used the coiled lines as bridle-reins. Hi carried his long-barrelled Mississippi yager, Jim held the Colt’s navy revolver in his right hand. On a wide circuit they set out, as if to get behind the buffalo and turn them toward the wagon.
“What are we goin’ to do? Where do we come in?” wildly appealed Left-over.
“We stay here, I reckon,” said Billy coolly.
“You and Davy and Left-over can whang away,” bade Mr. Baxter, with a laugh. “I’ll sit in the reserved seat and see the fun.”
So saying, he calmly clambered aboard and into the seat, where he stowed himself at languid ease.