"Oh, I'll be all right," replied Shock cheerfully.
"I have a small tent, a couple of coats, a pair of blankets, and my pony has got his oats."
"Yes," drawled Ike, regarding the cayuse with contemptuous eyes, "he's all right. You can't kill them fellers. But, as I remarked, you'd be better inside."
He walked around the buckboard and his eyes fell upon the doctor.
"What the—" Ike checked himself, either out of deference to Shock's profession or more likely from sheer amazement.
He turned down the buffalo, gazed at the sleeping figure with long and grave interest, then lifting his head he remarked with impressive solemnity, "Well, I be chawed and swallered! You HAVE got him, eh? Now, how did you do it?"
"Well," said Shock, "it was not difficult. I found him asleep in the International. I carried him out, and there he is."
"Say," said Ike, looking at Shock with dawning admiration in his eyes, "you're a bird! Is there anythin' else you want in that town? Guess not, else it would be here. The General said you'd kidnap him, and he was right. Now, what you goin' to do when he comes to? There aint much shelter in this bluff, and when he wakes he'll need someone to set up with him, sure. He's a terror, a dog-goned terror!"
"Oh, we'll manage," said Shock lightly. "I mean to start early in the morning."
"Before he gets up, eh? As I remarked before, you're a bird!"