There were not many who could first see Nat Wolfe without being attracted to give him another look. He had an air of absolute self-reliance, in which there was not a shadow of bravado; it was the coolness of often-tested strength and courage; his piercing eyes read every thing at a glance. Over six feet two in height, he was so lithe and symmetrical that he did not appear as large as he really was. His unshorn hair and beard, and his hunter's dress, gave a roughness to his appearance which was at least both picturesque and appropriate. Nat Wolfe would not have been himself, without the long boots drawn over the doeskin pants, the blue shirt, the leather belt, the brace of revolvers, the knife and the rifle which formed his daily costume. Perhaps a rifle can not properly be called an article of costume; but Nat's was to him like his good right arm—eating, sleeping, on foot or in saddle, it never left his side.
The smile he had given the girl was enough to make her look back at him kindly; it was a smile which he kept for children and helpless things, and all the brighter for being rare.
"You'd better be pushing on, men; it's fifteen miles to the first drop of water; it'll be ten o'clock to-night before your teams can reach it, if you urge them to do their best."
"I'm thinkin' we had," responded the leader of the train. "Goin' to ride our way, Wolfe?"
"Well, yes, I'm bound your way, at present. I'd thought to make forty miles before midnight, but I don't know that it matters. Maybe I'll keep 'long-side for a while."
The cold provisions were returned to their boxes, the women and children climbed to their places, the drivers flourished their heavy whips and shouted and swore at the patient oxen. As usual, Timothy Wright was the last to get started; and his niece Elizabeth, as she sat under the tent-like cover of the wagon, looked out forlornly on the winding array, tired of every thing but of seeing the strange horseman riding at the head of the company, and wishing he would stay with them forever.
Yes, forever! that did not seem too long to say, for she was sure the journey was endless—there was no limit to any thing more—the earth was like the sky, the desert was illimitable; she should never get away from that dreary caravan, never see trees or mountains again; the cattle would never crawl over all that heavy sand, they would never reach the far-distant Pike's Peak—never see the gold glittering in heaps all over it—thus the sad thoughts drifted through her mind as the sand drifted before the afternoon breeze.
Several times in the course of the afternoon, she crept out of the slow-moving wagon and walked by its side. The prairie was cut up by deep gullies worn by the spring freshets, and when the great wheels went jolting down these, it was pleasanter to be out of the wagon than in it. Although the track was sandy along which they wound, there was still a scanty covering of short grass struggling up through the arid soil, and occasional fringes of stunted cottonwood along the banks of empty streams—mere brush—trees she would not call them who remembered the magnificent forests of the home of her youth.
"Blast it! I've broke an axle!" exclaimed Timothy Wright, as the wheels went down a steep rut with a dangerous jerk, and stuck there. "The whole lot's gone over safe but me. Of course if there's trouble, it'll fall to me."
"It's our luck, Tim," said his wife, despondently.