The little log bridge was reached; the savages had all retreated, but the valorous Hallowell kept the mules at their fastest pace. The bridge was constructed of half-round logs, and of course was extremely rough; the wagon bounded up and down enough to shake the teeth out of one's head as the little animals went flying over it. Booth called out to Hallowell, "No need to drive so fast now, the Indians have all left us"; but he replied, "I ain't going to stop until I get across"; and down came the whip, on sped the mules, not breaking their short gallop until they were pulled up in front of Captain Conkey's quarters.
The rattling of the wagon on the bridge was the first intimation the garrison had of its return.
The officers came running out of their tents, the enlisted men poured out of their dugouts like a lot of ants, and Booth and Hallowell were surrounded by their friends in a moment. Captain Conkey ordered his bugler to sound "Boots and Saddles," and in less than ten minutes ninety troopers were mounted, and with the captain at their head started after the Indians.
When Hallowell tried to rise from his seat so as to get out every effort only resulted in his falling back. Some one stepped around to the other side to assist him, when it was discovered that the skirt of his overcoat had worked outside of the wagon-sheet and hung over the edge, and that three or four of the arrows fired at him by the savages had struck the side of the wagon, and, passing through the flap of his coat, had pinned him down. Booth pulled the arrows out and helped him up; he was pretty stiff from sitting in his cramped position so long, and his right arm dropped by his side as if paralysed.
Booth stood looking on while his comrade's wounds were being dressed, when the adjutant asked him: "What makes you shrug your shoulder so?" He answered, "I don't know; something makes it smart." The officer looked at him and said, "Well, I don't wonder; I should think it would smart; here's an arrow-head sticking into you," and he tried to pull it out, but it would not come. Captain Goldsborough then attempted it, but was not any more successful. The doctor then told them to let it alone, and he would attend to Booth after he had done with Hallowell. When he examined Booth's shoulder, he found that the arrow-head had struck the thick portion of the shoulder-blade, and had made two complete turns, wrapping itself around the muscles, which had to be cut apart before the sharp point could be withdrawn.
Booth was not seriously hurt. Hallowell, however, had received two severe wounds; the arrow that had lodged in his back had penetrated almost to his kidneys, and the wound in his thumb was very painful, not so much from the simple impact of the arrow as from the tearing away of the muscle by the shaft while he was whipping his mules; his right arm, too, was swollen terribly, and so stiff from the incessant use of it during the drive that for more than a month he required assistance in dressing and undressing.
The mules who had saved their lives were of small account after their memorable trip; they remained stiff and sore from the rough road and their continued forced speed. Booth and Hallowell went out to look at them the next morning, as they hobbled around the corral, and from the bottom of their hearts wished them well.
Captain Conkey's command returned to the cantonment about midnight. But one Indian had been seen, and he was south of the Arkansas in the sand hills.
The next morning a scouting-party of forty men, under command of a sergeant, started out to scour the country toward Cow Creek, northeast from the Walnut.
As I have stated, the troopers stationed at the cantonment on the Walnut were mostly recruits. Now the cavalry recruit of the old regular army on the frontier, thirty or forty years ago, mounted on a great big American horse and sent out with well-trained comrades on a scout after the hostile savages of the plains, was the most helpless individual imaginable. Coming fresh from some large city probably, as soon as he arrived at his station he was placed on the back of an animal of whose habits he knew as little as he did of the differential calculus; loaded down with a carbine, the muzzle of which he could hardly distinguish from the breech; a sabre buckled around his waist; a couple of enormous pistols stuck in his holsters; his blankets strapped to the cantle of his saddle, and, to complete the hopelessness of his condition in a possible encounter with a savage enemy who was ever on the alert, he was often handicapped by a camp-kettle or two, a frying-pan, and ten days' rations. No wonder this doughty representative of Uncle Sam's power was an easy prey for "Poor Lo," who, when he caught the unfortunate soldier away from his command and started after him, must have laughed at the ridiculous appearance of his enemy, with both hands glued to the pommel of his saddle, his hair on end, his sabre flying and striking his horse at every jump as the animal tore down the trail toward camp, while the Indian, rapidly gaining, in a few minutes had the scalp of the hapless rider dangling at his belt, and another of the "boys in blue" had joined the majority.