Page:The Prairie Flower; Or, Adventures In the Far West.djvu/42



"How comfortable deer meat smells. "

"But the Rapaho/' cried I, " what did IIP do?"

"Do!" answered Black George, with a singular expression that I could not de- tine : "Do! why he rid up to my hoss and stopped, he did; and didn't do nothin else, he didn't."

"How so?"

"Case he was done for."

"Dead?"

"As dog meat augh!"

"All! you had killed him.then?" cried I.

"No I hadn't though. "

"What then? '"

"He'd died himself, Ke had."

"How, died ?"

"Froze, young Bossons froze as stiff nor a white oak. "

_" Froze!" echoed two or three voices, mine among the rest.

"Yes, blaze my old carcass and send me a wollin, ef he hadn't! and I, like a

fool, had been runnin away from a

dead nigger. Maybe I did'nt swear some, andj^ay a few thataint spoke in the pulpit. You'd jest better believe, strangers, I felt soft as a chowdered possum."

"But how had he followed you if he was dead?"

"He hadn't, not pertikerlarly; but his hoss had; for in course he didn't know his rider was rubbed out; and so he kept on arter mine, till the divin o' old Skinflint fetched him up a-standin."

"Of course you were rejoiced at your escape?"

"Why, sort o' so, and sort o' not; for I felt so all-fired mean, to think I'd bin run nin from and shootin to a dead Injin, that for a long spell 1 couldn't git wind enough to say nothin.

"At last I sez, sez I, ' This here's purty business now, aint it? I reckons, old bea ver, you've had little to do, to be foolin your time and burnin your powder this way; ' and then I outs with old butcher, and swore I'd raise his hair.

"Well, I coaxed my way up to his old hoss, and got hold on himself; but it wasn't a darned bit o' use; he was froze tight to the saddle. I tried to cut into him, but Til be dog-gone ef my kuife ud enter more'n 'twould into a stcr.e. Jest then \ luk a look round, and may I be rum-

boozled, ef the sun hadn't got thawed a leetle, and, arter strainin so hard, had gone down with a jump right behind a big ridge.

"' Well,' sez 1, ' this nigger'd betterbe making tracks somewhar, or he'll spile, sure.'

"So wishin old Rapaho a pleasant time on't I tried Skinflint, but ^ndin it wasn't no go, X gathered up sieh things from my possibles as I couldn't do without, pulled the arrers out o' me, and off I sot for a ridge 'bout five mile away.

"When I got thar, it was so dark you couldn't tell a tree from a nigger; and the wind phe-ew! it blowed so one time that I had to hitch on to a rock to keep myself any whar. I tried to strike a fire, but my fingers was so cold I couldn't, and the snow had kivered up every tiling, so that thar wasn't nothin to make it on.

"' It's a screech er,' I sez, to myself, ' and afore daylight I'll be rubbed out, sartin.'

"At last I begun to feel so queer, and so sleepy I couldn't hardly keep open my peepers. I knowed ef I laid down and slept, I was a gone beaver; and so stum- blin about, I got hold o' a tree, and begun to climb; and when I got up high enough, I slid down agin; and you'd better believe this here operation felt good ef it didn't I wouldn't tell ye so.

"The whole blessed night I worked in this way, and it blowin, and snowin, amd freezin all the time like sixty. At h,st mornin come, but it was a darned long time about it, and arter I'd gin in tlat daylight wasn't no whar.

"Well, soon's I could see, off I sot, amd traveled, and traveled, I didn't know which way nor whar, till night had come agin, and I hadn't seen nothin human and besides, I'd eat up all my fodder. I tried to shoot somethin, but I'll be dogged ef thar was any varmints to shoot o' no kind they was all froze up tighter nor darnation.

"That night went like w. ther, in rubbin a tree; and the next day I sot on agin, and traveled till night, without eatin a bit o' food. I had a leetle bacca, and that 1 chawed like all git out, until I'd chawed il all up, and begun to think I was chawed up myself. I'd got, though, whar 1 could find a few sticks, and I made