“Where, young man, where?”
“From Chicago on. They got it as far as Cheyenne, but that was the very place of all others where they would be apt to hunt for me. I got news of a detective hanging about the camp, and I was sure he had come there to track me. I had my wages and my clothes, and when I found they had traced me there, I spent all I had for my horse and took my pack and struck out over the plains.” He paused and wiped the cold drops from his forehead, then lifted his head with gathered courage. “One day,––I found these people, nigh starving for both water and food, and without strength to go where they could be provided for. They, too, were refugees, I learned, and so I cast my lot with theirs, and served them as best I could.”
“And now they have fallen to the two of us to provide for. You say, give you work? I’ve lived here these twenty years and found work for no man but myself. I’ve found plenty of that––just to keep alive, part of the time. It’s bad here in the winter––if the stores give out. Tell me what you know of these women.”
“Where is the man?”
“Dead. I found him dead before I reached them. I left him lying where I found him, and pushed on––got there just in time. He wasn’t three hours away from them as a man walks. I made them as comfortable as I could and saw that no Indians were about, nor had been, they said; so I ventured back and made a grave for him as best I could, and told the daughter only, for the old lady seemed out of her head. I don’t know what we can do with her if she gets worse. I don’t know.” As the big man talked he noticed the younger one growing calmer and listening intently.
“Before I buried him I searched him and found a few papers––just letters in a strange language, and from the feeling of his coat I judged others were hid––sewed in it, so I fetched it back to her––the young one. You thought I was long gone, and there was where you made the blunder. How did you suppose I came by the pack mule and the other horse?”
“When I saw them, I knew you must have gone to Higgins’ Camp and back, but how could I know it before? You might have been in need of me, and of food.”
“We’ll say no more of it. Those men at the camp are beasts. I bought those animals and paid gold for them. They wanted to know where I got the gold. I told them where they’d never get it. They asked me ten prices for those beasts, and then tried to keep me there until they could clean me out and get hold of my knowledge. But I skipped away in the night when they were all drunk and asleep. Then I had to make a long detour to put them off the track if they should try to follow me, and all that took time.”