“He goes in the gunny sack for supper,” said Rob. “Do you suppose he’ll keep for three days, a hundred and fifty miles? I shouldn’t wonder if Shannon would enjoy a bite, for he’ll be hungry by that time.”
“It’s a long, long way, up to the Mandans!” John began to sing again. “Six hundred miles. And we’ll have to have gas pretty soon.”
They finished their breakfast, and, with the skill they had gained in many camps together, soon were packed and on their way above the old council camp of the Sioux.
“Buffalo and elk, every way you can look!” exclaimed John. “Elk swimming across the river. Herds of game feeding on the bluff sides! Grouse, foxes, prairie dogs, jack rabbits, pelicans, squirrels, deer, wolves—the boats full of meat all the time, and two or three beaver every night! Now there’s cottonwoods. By and by the river’ll begin to take a straighter shoot north. It’s a long, long way up to the Mandans!”
“And right through the country of those roaming, murdering Sioux!” added Rob.
“Right you are, Rob,” said Uncle Dick. “The Sioux used to hunt and rob as far as Fort Laramie, six hundred miles up the Platte, and on the head of the Jim River in Dakota, and all between. Their homes were where their hats were—and they hadn’t any hats.”
For some days now they threaded their way among the countless islands and sand bars of the great river, until at last they made camp early on the evening of June 9th, near the point which, as closely as they could figure it, was about where the Lewis and Clark bateau lay at the time George Shannon was found wandering on the Plains, alone and ready to despair. This was about thirty miles below the mouth of the White River.
“Well, we’ve got him,” said Jesse, solemnly, “and told him never to leave camp without matches and ammunition and an ax. And that’s that!”
“Time for another catfish, Jesse,” said their leader. “John, you take the .22 and wander along the edge of the bluff. You might see a young jack rabbit. I don’t believe I’d bother the ducks, for that’s against the law and we don’t break laws even when we are not watched. Rob, you and I will make camp—we’ll not need anything but the mosquito bars.”