"Yes, I'm going."
"Will you let me go with you?"
"You don't look much like roughing it, and the trip is not only hard, but it may be dangerous. The redskins are beginning to act wolfish on the plains."
"I think I can stand as much hardship as you. You are light and slender."
"But tough as an old buffalo bull, for all that. I've been brought up in the saddle, with rifle and lasso in hand. I'm used to wind and weather, sunshine and storm–they're all alike to me."
"And Indians?"
"Yes–to Comanche, Kiowa, and Apache. But these Cheyennes and Sioux are a tougher breed, they tell me. I'll soon learn them too, I reckon. There's one thing sure, I don't go in no crowd of twenty or thirty, with wagons or pack mules along to tempt the cusses with, while they make the travel slow. You want either a big crowd or a very small one, if you travel in an Indian country.
"You have not answered my question yet. Will you let me go through to the Black Hills with you?"
"Why don't you go with the other party? They'll take you, I'll bet."
"I do not want to go where Wild Bill will see me. He may think his wife has sent me as a spy on his movements and actions."