That evening, with clatter of hoof and volley of victorious whoops and rifle-shots, amidst the sunset they galloped into the New Mexican village of Don Fernandez de Taos, sixty miles west from where they had parted with the Santa Fé bound caravan.
Taos, or “old Touse,” as it was affectionately styled, lies in a mountain valley eighty miles north of Santa Fé. Here had his home and headquarters Kit Carson, captain over his company of forty-five trappers. He lived in one of the box-like clay houses, with his little daughter Adaline. Adaline, four years old, was a dark, elfish lass, half Indian; for her mother, Kit Carson’s wife, had been an Arapahoe. Kit had married this Arapahoe in the mountains, in the summer of 1835, but she had died soon after the birth of little Adaline.
“Kit thought a heap o’ Alice,” declared Sol Silver, to Oliver. “Some trappers jest take a squaw as cook an’ lodge cleaner, an’ all that. But Kit air true man. He named his squaw Alice, an’ when she died he felt mighty bad. He’s got that gal to raise, now.”
The Kit Carson company of trappers were divided into two bands, under Lieutenant Ike Chamberlain and Lieutenant Sol Silver. They took turns going upon excursions after beaver—or sometimes they all were out together.
Besides the beaver-hunting, there was the buffalo-hunting for Bent’s Fort. Northeast of Taos, 250 and more miles, upon the Arkansas River in southern Colorado of to-day, was the large clay-built trading-post of Bent’s Fort, or Fort William, its hardy garrison trafficking with 20,000 wild Cheyennes, Utes, and Arapahoes.
Kit Carson had the contract for supplying the garrison with meat. So twice a year, in spring and in fall, the Carson men gathered at Bent’s Fort, for a great buffalo-hunt. Into the fort were brought thousands of pounds of buffalo-meat.
The great Kit Carson did not seem to think much of Oliver, after landing him in Taos. He gave him a place to sleep and a place at table; but he did not send him out to trap beaver, or hunt buffalo, or rescue traders. He put him upon the shabby mule, and set him at his old job of tending a horse-herd.
“It’s this way, boy,” consoled Sol Silver, when Oliver would complain. “You do well what’s yores to be done, an’ chance at more will come.”
The extra horses and mules belonging to the Kit Carson company were pastured in the open on the outskirts of town. Every morning they must be driven out to graze, and every evening they must be brought back to the corral. It was Oliver’s business to drive them out and to drive them back—which he did with many shouts and much rope-waving and gallant racing by his ancient mule. Thus for a year he was the official herder for the Carson company.
The Carson men came and went. Oliver heard their stories, of stirring deeds by themselves or by Bill Williams, Jim Bridger, Captain Billy Sublette, and others; and by Kit Carson. On the other hand, he never heard “Kit” (as his friends lovingly called him) make much mention of himself in any adventures; somebody else always was the hero.