After the money and that portion of my papers that had got wet were dried, Mrs. Wood handed them to me, saying, "These are all right now, and by to-morrow you will be yourself again."
I had started in twice before to tell them how I happened to be in such a condition; but they would divert me by making some irrelevant remark about their horses, or "Look out, boys, and see if you can see any buffalo," and wind up by saying they were anxious to hear how it happened, but they wanted to be all together when I related it.
The fact was: I had laughed outright when I sat down to the table, when I first arrived; then again I laughed when putting on Buck's clothes. They mistook the looks of my eyes, and the actions of the two lost soldiers were in their minds; so they thought I was on the border-land of daftness. All this they told me a month later.
At the dinner hour I ate two biscuits, though I could have eaten ten. They said, "Drink all the coffee you want and to-morrow you can have all the bread and meat you can eat."
About 3 o'clock in the afternoon I went to sleep on a bed they had prepared for me early in the forenoon, behind the curtain. Nor did I wake up until seven o'clock the next morning, having slept soundly for sixteen hours. Nor did I know for nearly a month afterward, that the three men had taken turns, time about, all night, watching me. They said they did not know what might happen; for one of the lost soldiers from old Fort Bent, on the Arkansas, had got up in the night, and with a neck-yoke in his hands was striking right and left at imaginary foes, saying, "Come on, you copper-skinned devils; I'm good for the whole Cheyenne tribe!"
When I came out in the presence of the family, Mr. Wood asked me how I felt. I said: "Splendid; I slept good and sound all night, and I could walk forty miles to-day." The breakfast had been over for an hour. My breakfast was awaiting me; and, after taking a good wash I sat down to a plate piled up with biscuits, another with several great slices of tender buffalo-meat, stewed apples, and rich milk gravy (they had three cows with them). Strong coffee completed the "bill of fare." And I could, and I did, eat all I wanted. The women-folks had washed, dried, and ironed my clothes.
CHAPTER V.
We Move.—Acres of Buffalo.—Indian Scare.—Killed Two Bears.—First Wedding in the Panhandle.—At Last!—Fort Elliott.—Meet Romero and Son.—The Great Buffalo-slayer.—What Gen. Sheridan Said.—The Great Slaughter Begun.