Buffalo Bill knew, in spite of Miller’s protestations and nerve, that Don was not yet well, but good food, rest, and bathing in these springs would help him; so he decided to go regularly into camp there.
They need have no dread of Indians there, and they had left no trail to be followed easily.
They would halt there, for the men needed the rest, and he and Black Bill would take short searches to try and find the Lost Valley and its mysterious people.
Several times in the last day the giant negro had halted and regarded his surroundings in a fixed way. He seemed to be trying to recall some feature in the landscape as though he had seen it before.
It had been two months and more since he was there before, if he had passed that way in his wanderings, and then the trees were bright green, in midsummer.
Now they were changing to autumn tints, and, as is well known, this changed the whole aspect of the country.
The springs the negro had not seen, though there were people from the Lost Valley who had been there.
“Black Bill has been near here before, I feel certain, Sergeant Buck, and our plan is to scout about the mountains until we strike some locality familiar to him.”
“Yes, chief, that is just it, sir.”