"Yes. The old fool's had a row over the ferryboat. Hit'd take two weeks to git us all over that way, anyhow. He's declared fer fordin' the hull outfit, lock, stock an' barrel. To save a few dollars, he's a goin' to lose a lot o' loads an' drownd a lot o' womern an' babies--that's what he's goin' to do. Some o' us called a halt an' stood out fer a council. We want you to come on up.
[pg 62]
"Woodhull's there," he added. "He sides with the old man, o' course. He rid on the same seat with that gal all day till now. Lord knows what he done or said. Ain't hit nigh about time now, Major?"
"It's nigh about time," said Will Banion quietly.
They rode side by side, past more than a mile of the covered wagons, now almost end to end, the columns continually closing up. At the bank of the river, at the ferry head, they found a group of fifty men. The ranks opened as Banion and Jackson approached, but Banion made no attempt to join a council to which he had not been bidden.
A half dozen civilized Indians of the Kaws, owners or operators of the ferry, sat in a stolid line across the head of the scow at its landing stage, looking neither to the right nor the left and awaiting the white men's pleasure. Banion rode down to them.
"How deep?" he asked.
They understood but would not answer.
"Out of the way!" he cried, and rode straight at them. They scattered. He spurred his horse, the black Spaniard, over the stage and on the deck of the scow, drove him its full length, snorting; set the spurs hard at the farther end and plunged deliberately off into the swift, muddy stream.