On one occasion while at the fort a large Government herd of horses, lately brought up from Texas, where they had been captured wild on the prairies, stampeded, and could not be retaken.
Once or twice Billy had come into the fort with a pony of the fugitive herd which he had captured, and the quartermaster said to him:
"Billy, if that herd remains much longer free, they will be harder to take than real wild horses, so go to work and I'll give you a reward of ten dollars for every one you bring in, for the Government authorizes me to make that offer."
This was just to Billy's taste, and he went at once home and spent a couple of days preparing for the work before him, and from which his mother and sisters tried to dissuade him; but the boy saw in it a bonanza and would not give it up.
His own pony, Rascal, he knew, was not fast enough for the work ahead, so he determined to get a better mount, and rode over to the fort to see a sergeant who had an animal not equaled for speed on the plains.
Rascal, some sixty dollars, a rifle, and some well-tanned skins were offered for the sergeant's horse and refused, and in despair Billy knew not what to do, for he had gotten to the end of his personal fortune.
"Sergeant," he suddenly cried, as a bright idea seized him.
"Well, Billy?"
"They say you are the crack shot in the fort."
"I am too, Billy."