Oh, dear, why don’t people be good, and do as they would be done by? How much happier this world would be if there were no thieves nor wicked people in it. I know it is hard for Mr. Curry to give up his fine horse without making an effort to get it back. Yet I feel sure he will not get it. For if he found it he could not force the thieves to give it to him.
ANXIOUSLY WAITING AT HAM’S FORK.
Sunday, August 13.
It was decided this morning that Hillhouse, Sim and Mr. Curry would go in pursuit of the horse thieves. Sim is just recovering from a severe sickness, and is not able to go on such a trip, but he positively refused to stay in camp and let Hillhouse and Mr. Curry go without him. I believe it will prove a wild goose chase, so mother and I exacted a promise from Hillhouse that he will not stay away to-night. We are looking for him. It is getting dark. Surely they will not leave us here in this wilderness with only two boys and Cæsar for protection. If we are left alone, I shall take my turn, with Winthrop and Alex Curry standing guard in camp. Sim rode Dick this morning, the others walked. What they expect to do if they find the thieves (which they are not likely to do) I do not know.
Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy, Mr. and Mrs. Bower, Nellie and Alton, and Mr. Grier’s teams passed here to-day. They left the train the next morning after we did. The train had not started then. They said Neelie was about as when we left, and Mrs. Hardinbrooke was no worse.
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Monday, August 14.
Hillhouse came in about an hour after dark. He was very tired and hungry; had walked since early morning until he started back at three o’clock. He tried to prevail upon Sim to return, and let him go on with Mr. Curry if he must go. But Sim would not listen to such a proposition, although he is still weak from his late sickness. Mr. Curry thinks he will find his horse at the ranch near the junction, although the trail they were following led away from, instead of toward it. If he finds it, he will go back to the train and get the men to help him get it either by fair means or by force.
He then proposed that they keep Dick, but they said he would not reach camp before midnight on foot and he might lose his way, but Dick would take him the shortest route if he would just let him go his own way, which he did, and he brought him safe about an hour after dark.
I am so sorry for Mrs. Curry. She tries to be brave for her children’s sake, but any one can see she suffers, and Alex says she does not eat at all, just takes a cup of tea once in a while.