"Yes. I tell you we want to get away from here when the blizzards fly, for there isn't a thing to shelter us. I don't expect we shall find more than fifty head of those cattle, if we do that."
"What do you suppose will become of them?"
"They will be dead, of course. You see, when cattle are loose on the prairie and a storm comes up, and they can't stand it any longer, they start and travel in the same way the storm is going; and as the storm lasts from three to four days, you can readily imagine that they must get exhausted before they stop. When the hailstones come down as large as hens' eggs, you can——"
"Haw, haw!" laughed Monroe.
"Well, as large as pigeons' eggs," said Kelley, "and I won't come down another grain in weight. Why, an army officer went by here two years ago hunting for his thirty-five mules that had been stampeded by a storm, and when he found them, there were only four that were able to stand alone. Oh, you get out, Monroe! You haven't seen any blizzard yet. Now, let's go in and get some supper."
"But what makes the mules run so? Why don't they go under shelter?" added Tom, as he picked up his poncho and saddle and followed the man inside the house.
"There was just where they were going—for shelter. There aint a piece of timber within twenty-five miles of this place to shelter a rabbit."
"Then what do you use for fuel?"
"Buffalo chips. There, Tom, put your plunder in there and set down and look around you. You wouldn't think the man who owns this place was worth two hundred thousand, but it is a fact."
"Why doesn't he buy a better piece of ground, then? I wouldn't be so far from shelter if I were in his place."