It was very certainly a good shot. The antelope had been at long range. The two Indians had been astonished.
As they trotted off, to secure the fallen animal, I could not help feeling that in their eyes, at least, I had in some measure justified the benevolence towards me of Old Spotted Tail.
On the third day we struck the Emigrant trail. The night before, we had encamped in a spot which was as lovely as any I have ever seen. A running rivulet of deliciously cool water, fledged by green trees and arched in by the broad blue heaven, which girdles in life on the Plains, gave us, on its banks, a resting-place. Here, I slept well, and woke in the morning with a fresh consciousness of the life, vigor, and beauty of the world.
Two hours after our start this day, we struck the trail.
The guides came to a sudden halt, and pointing to the route I had to continue, abruptly left me. Their characteristic taciturnity had not deserted them for a single instant.
During the whole of this day I followed the trail, overtaking and passing one Emigrant train, from whom, naturally enough, I could learn nothing of any which had preceded it. On the succeeding morning, I, however, encountered the Pony Express, and on inquiry learnt that a long train, with a large number of horses, had been passed by it. This train had been encamped at Sweet Water, close to Independence Rock, near what the rider called the old Frenchman's.
"How far off, is it?" I asked.
"You may reach them or their halting-place by to-morrow noon," was the response.
He evidently did not know the speed of the animal I was mounted on, or my temper. It was before nine on the following morning, that I arrived at Captain Crim's halting-place. He had been detained here by a distemper which had attacked the horses, and possibly, as Brighton Bill asserted, by a faint hope that I might yet make my re-appearance.