The former opened' his eyes, and saw the buffalo feeding on the plain. "Ho, boy," he said, touching his companion, "thar's meat a-run-nin'."
La Bonté looked in the direction the other pointed, stood up, and hitching round his pouch and powder-horn, drew the stopper from the latter with his teeth, and placing the mouth in the palm of his left hand, turned the horn up and shook it.
"Not a grain," he said—"not a grain, old hoss."
"Wagh!" exclaimed the other, "we'll have to eat afore long,"—and rising, walked into the prairie. He had hardly stepped two paces, when, passing close to a sage-bush, a rattlesnake whizzed a note of warning with its tail. Killbuck grinned, and taking the wiping-stick from his rifle-barrel, tapped the snake on the head, and taking it by the tail, threw it to La Bonté, saying, "hyar's meat, anyhow." The old fellow followed up his success by slaying half-a-dozen more, and brought them in skewered through the head on his wiping-stick. A fire was soon kindled, and the snakes roasting before it; when La Bonté, who sat looking at buffalo which fed close to the rock, suddenly saw them raise their heads, snuff the air, and scamper towards him. A few minutes afterwards, a huge shapeless body loomed in the refracted air, approaching the spot where the buffalo had been grazing. The hunters looked at it and then at each other, and ejaculated "Wagh!" Presently a long white mass showed more distinctly, followed by another, and before each was a string of animals.
"Wagons, by hoss and beaver! Hurrah for Conestoga!" exclaimed the trappers in a breath, as they now observed two white-tilted wagons, drawn by several pairs of mules, approaching the very spot where they sat. Several mounted men were riding about the wagons, and two on horseback, in advance of all, were approaching the rock, when they observed the smoke curling from the hunters' fire. They halted at sight of this; and one of the two, drawing a long instrument from a case, which Killbuck voted a rifle, directed it towards them for a moment, and then lowering it, again moved forward.
As they drew near, the two poor trappers, although half-dead with joy, still retained their seats with Indian gravity and immobility of feature, turning now and then the crackling snakes which lay on the embers of the fire. The two strangers approached. One, a man of some fifty years of age, of middle height and stoutly built, was clad in a white shooting-jacket, of cut unknown in mountain tailoring, and a pair of trousers of the well-known material called shepherd's plaid; a broad-brimmed Panama shaded his face, which was ruddy with health and exercise; a belt round the waist supported a handsome bowie-knife, and a double-barreled fowling-piece was slung across his shoulder.
His companion was likewise dressed in a light shooting-jacket, of many pockets and dandy cut, rode on an English saddle and in boots, and was armed with a superb double rifle, glossy from the case, and bearing few marks of use or service. He was a tall fine-looking fellow of thirty, with light hair and complexion; a scrupulous beard and mustache; a wide-awake hat, with a short pipe stuck in the band, not very black with smoke; an elaborate powder-horn over his shoulder, with a Cairngorm in the butt as large as a plate; a blue handkerchief tied round his throat in a sailor's knot, and the collar of his shirt turned carefully over it. He had, moreover, a tolerable idea of his very correct appearance, and wore Woodstock gloves.
The trappers looked at them from head to foot, and the more they looked, the less could they make them out.
"H——!" exclaimed La Bonté, emphatically.
"This beats grainin' bull-hide slick," broke from Killbuck as the strangers reined up at the fire, the younger dismounting, and staring with wonder at the weather-beaten trappers.