We were still three or four days away from our self-set task, when, as if by mutual agreement, the fish would not be caught, the ducks and geese took flight south, and the chickens left our vicinity. To use a western phrase, "The luck was agin' us." We had started with two salt buffalo tongues as our outfit, when we left Mr. Woolsey. We had still one of these left. We boiled it, and ate half the first day of our hard luck. We worked harder and later at our ploughing the second day. We finished the tongue and ploughed on. The third day we finished our task about two o'clock, and then I took my gun and hunted until dark, while Glad gathered and hobbled the horses close to camp. Not a rabbit or duck or chicken did I see.
If I had been a pagan Indian, I would have said, "Mine enemy hath done this. Somebody is working bad medicine about me." But I had long before this found out that the larder of a hunter or fisherman is apt to be empty at times.
Glad and I sat beside our camp-fire that night, and were solemn and quiet. There was a something lacking in our surroundings, and we felt it keenly. For a week we had been on very short "commons," and since yesterday had not tasted any food, and worked hard. In the meantime, there is no denying it, we were terribly hungry.
Early next morning we took down our tent and packed our stuff. We had neither pack nor riding-saddles, as we had come this far with William, and we had hoped that he would have returned before we were through our work; but going on the plains was going into a large country.
You might strike the camp soon, or you might be weeks looking for them, and when you found the Indians, they might be in a worse condition as to provisions than you were. This all depended on the buffalo in their migrations—sometimes here, and again hundreds of miles away. William may turn up any time, and it may be a month or six weeks before we hear from him. As it is, Glad and I do the best we can without saddles, and start for home.
Having the oxen, we went slow.
After travelling about ten miles, I saw someone coming towards us, and presently made out that it was a white man, and I galloped on to meet him, and found that it was Neils, the Norwegian, who was with Mr. Woolsey. He was on foot, but I saw he had a small pack on his back, and my first question was, "Have you anything to eat?" and he said he had a few boiled tongues on his back. Then I told him that Glad and I were very hungry, and would very soon lighten his pack. He told me Mr. Woolsey had become anxious about us, and at last sent him to see if we were still alive. When Glad came up, we soon showed Neils that our appetites were fully alive, for we each took a whole tongue and ate it; then we split another in two and devoured that. And now, in company with Neils, we continued our journey, reaching Mr. Woolsey's the same evening, but making great attempts to lower the lakes and creeks by the way, for our thirst after the salt tongues was intense.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
Establish a fishery—Build a boat—Neils becomes morbid—I watch him.