"Besides, they're taking meat for their village, wherever it may be," said Brady, "and they're not dreaming that white men whose heads can furnish nice scalps are near."
Will shivered a little, and clapped one hand to his hair, which was uncommonly thick and fine.
"Your scalp is thar, right an' tight, young William," said the Little Giant, "but ef the Sioux got up close to you, you'd hev to hold it on with both han's 'stead o' one. Hev any o' you fellers noticed that all of us hev pow'ful thick, strong hair that would make splendid scalps fit to hang in the tepees o' the head chiefs theirselves? It's remarkyble how fine they are, speshully on the heads o' old men like Jim an' Steve."
"Thomas Bent, you irreverent and chunky imp," said Brady, "I, the oldest of this party, am but thirty-eight. I have not yet reached the full prime of my physical powers, and if I should be put to it I could administer to you the thrashing you need."
"And I'm only thirty-six," said Boyd, "and I've licked Tom often and often, though sometimes, when he's feeling right peart, I'd have to use both hands to do it. But I don't have any feeling against him when I do the job. It's just to improve his language and manners. These boys of thirty-two or three are so pesky full of life and friskiness that you have to treat 'em as you would young lions. Before we met you in the mountains, Steve, I generally gave him his thrashing in the morning before breakfast."
He reached a large palm for the Little Giant, who leaped lightly away and laughed.
"Lend me your glasses, young William," he said. "I'd like to climb one o' the cotton woods myself an' take a look at the Indian hunters. O' course you're a bright boy, young William, an' Jim an' Steve are so old they're boun' to hev some intelligence forced upon 'em, but ez fur me brightness an' intelligence come nateral, an' though mighty modest 'bout it, I reckon I'm a kind o' Napoleon o' the West. They say our figgers are tremenjeously alike, though, o' course, I'm thicker an' much stronger than he wuz, an' perhaps a lot brighter in some ways."
"Go on, you supreme egotist," said Brady in his usual solemn tones, "climb the tree, where I cannot hear your voice, and stay there a long time."
The Little Giant was more serious than he pretended to be. He was fully aware that they had lost at least seventy-five per cent of their security when they descended from the high mountains. On the plains it was difficult to fortify against attack, and he did not like the appearance of the Indians, even as hunters on the far side of the buffalo herd. Hence, when he had made himself comfortable in one of the highest forks of a cottonwood, his examination through the glasses was long and critical. He saw, just as Will had seen, the herd coming forever from under the southeastern rim of the horizon and disappearing forever under the northwestern rim. Then he caught glimpses of the hunters still pursuing and cutting out the fat young cows, but instead of being parallel with the little party in the dip they had now passed far beyond it. Then he descended the tree and spoke what he thought.
"Jim Boyd, hunter, Steve Brady, trapper, an' young William," he said, "I'm of the opinion that we'd better stay here at least one day an' night. The river o' buffaloes will be flowin' by at least that long, but ef we wuz to go on an' they wuz to pass us, we might meet the warriors with no river in between, an' we ain't looking fur that."