“Just looking around the West, that’s all,” replied Reginald de Bray buoyantly.
“Ain’t seen much of it yit, hev ye?”
“Just started.”
“So I reckoned,” muttered Lonesome Pete. “Them clothes o’ your’n is a danger-signal. A real collar an’ a b’iled shirt, say nothin’ of a red vest, is purty nigh a death-warrant fer a man in these parts. The cimiroons what inhabit this hyer waste don’t like sich displays. As soon as we git ter Sun Dance, I’d advise ye ter duck inter a store an’ git inter a rig less noticeable.”
“Why—why,” fluttered De Bray, “I hadn’t any idea that—that——”
“Course ye didn’t,” interrupted Lonesome Pete soothingly. “Ye’re plumb tender in the feet, an’ yer clothes give ye away. Arter takin’ yer sizin’, the hull camp would want ter hev fun with ye, an’ ye kin bank on it that it ’u’d be rough fun.”
“I heard that Mr. Buffalo Bill was in Sun Dance,” said De Bray, “and I have long wanted to meet him. That’s principally why I came this way from Montegordo.”
“He’s thar, all right,” said Pete. “That’s one o’ his pards on the back seat—Leetle Cayuse, they calls him.”
“By Jove!” muttered De Bray, turning squarely around and staring in awe at the Piute boy. “I’ve heard of that Indian,” he went on, facing about. “He don’t look very dangerous, though, does he?”
“He’s retirin’, an’ about the size of a minner, when thar’s nothin’ doin’, but when he digs up the hatchet an’ hits the war-path, he looks like er whale.”