CHAPTER FIVE: BUDDY RUNS TRUE TO TYPE
One never could predict with any certainty how long Indians
would dance before they actually took the trail of murder and
pillage. So much depended upon the Medicine, so much on signs
and portents. It was even possible that they might, for some
mysterious reason unknown to their white neighbors, decide at
the last moment to bide their time. The Tomahawk outfit
worked from dawn until dark, and combed the foothills of the
Snowies hurriedly, riding into the most frequented, grassy
basins and wide canyons where the grass was lush and sweet
and the mountain streams rushed noisily over rocks. As fast
as the cattle were gathered they were pushed hastily toward
the Platte, And though the men rode warily with rifles as
handy as their ropes, they rode in peace.
Buddy, proud of his job, counting himself as good a man as
any of them, became a small riding demon after rebellious
saddle horses, herding them away from thick undergrowth that
might, for all he knew, hold Indians waiting a chance to
scalp him, driving the REMUDA close to the cabins when night
fell, because no man could be spared for night herding,
sleeping lightly as a cat beside a mouse hole. He did not say
much, perhaps because everyone was too busy to talk, himself
included.
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