"Yis, but it goes agin' the grit to think it was Nat Wolfe done it instid of me. Ain't I the guide and purtector of the train? and it don't become me to be letting strangers save the women-folks from destruction. He did it in fust rate style, though; I'll say that much for him. As long as Buckskin Joe couldn't have a hand in the fight, I'd ruther it would be Nat Wolfe than anybody else."
"Do you know him?" asked Mr. Wright.
"Wal, I never sot eyes on him till to-day; but I knew him the minit he rode up alongside. All us trappers and guides knows him, leastwise by hearsay. I'd often hearn tell of that cut over his eye, and the queer color of his ha'r. The Injuns call him Golden Arrow, both bekase his hair is so yellow and bekase he's as swift and sure as a dart. They're 'so 'fraid of Golden Arrow they cl'ar out whenever they hear he's about. I knew him by his hight, too. He's sent more buffaloes and red-skins to their furren huntin'-grounds than any other ten men on the plains. He fust sends an Injun to the spirit-land, and then, for fear the dead rascal won't have nuthin' to do in the new country, he sends a score of buffaloes after him to keep him in game. Years ago, when this country wasn't quite so thickly settled as it is now and every white man that tried to lay out a trail over the mountains had to fight them devils, inch by inch, Nat Wolfe took a lastin' hate to the sarpints, and he hain't got over it yet. He's a young-looking man now—twenty year younger'n me—but he's been in sarvice as long as I. I hope that train on ahead of us has got some fresh meat to spare, for I ain't bagged a buffalo to-day, we've been in such a hurry. I promise you a nice bit of antelope for your supper to-morrow, Miss."
The speaker was a small, wiry person, dressed in leather leggins and woolen hunting-frock, whose profession had been that of a guide for years; but the trail across the country being now so well defined and defended as to render his services rather supererogatory, he occasionally joined an emigrant train for the love of it, when not off with exploring parties. He was on his way to Pike's Peak with an idea of his own; his former experience led him to believe that he could make discoveries for himself in a certain part of the mountains as yet almost unvisited. Whatever the fond name some proud mother may have bestowed upon him in the far-off days of his babyhood, to whatever frontier family he may have belonged, and to whose patronymic he would have done honor, all other titles were obliterated in that of Buckskin Joe. Perhaps fifty years of age, with iron-gray hair, sharp, weather-beaten features, as tough as he was small, supple, quick, enduring as iron, and ready for all emergencies, he had won considerable reputation as a guide, and was a valuable acquisition to our western bound party.
He had taken a great fancy to the beautiful, modest young girl whose face lighted up the rough company like a flower in a desert; and he could not recover from the mortification of having, for once, been caught in a situation where his wit was of no avail, and obliged to see another achieve a rescue which he was powerless to attempt. As he trotted along beside the wagon, he presently broke out again:
"It's all-fired mean to think I made sich a fool of myself. I've a mind to take it up and fight it out with Wolfe; he'd no business to come meddling with my matters. It was my business to look after the women-folks."
"So you had rather I should have been killed, than to have any one else but yourself save me?" queried Elizabeth, with a burst of silver laughter that sent the blood tingling through his veins. "If you feel so badly about it, Mr. Buckskin, I'll manage to get into danger again, and so give you a chance to retrieve yourself."
"I shouldn't wonder a bit if you did, without tryin' very hard, nuther. I don't pray for it; but if it comes, Buckskin Joe'll be on hand, you may bet your life. As for Mr. Buckskin, I don't know whar' he'll be—he's too perlite a feller for these parts."
"I beg your pardon, Joe," cried the young girl, merrily, her depression of spirits quite driven away for the moment by the quaint manner of the guide, whom she had already taken a liking to.
"Wal, don't do it ag'in," he responded, more disturbed by the civility than he would have been by a hug from a grizzly bear.