Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/78

58 through by 11 o'clock, and after eating a "snack"—a lunch—we started on the elk hunt.

After going about four miles we jumped up a band of fifty elk, which was considered a small herd then. But we didn't get close enough to shoot any of them.

"Let 'em go," said Uncle Kit; "no doubt they will go to the quaking-asp grove, and we can git 'em to-morrow." So we returned to camp without any elk. But the next morning we went to the quaking-asp thicket, and there, sure enough, we found the same band of elk, and succeeded in killing five of them. Thus we had enough meat to last a year, if we had wanted that much, and we had skins enough for our beds and moccasins for the winter.

Now we were in no danger of starving, and from now on we could devote our whole attention to the traps.

I had to work very hard that winter, but I was much better contented than when I was with Drake and in the grasp of that old "nigger wench."

Not until now did I tell Uncle Kit of the prank I played on the black tyrant. I also told him why I was so anxious to get away from St. Louis. That it was I feared Drake would discover me and take me back to his farm and the society of his slaves.

Mr. Hughes here interrupted me to say: "Well, Willie, you are safe enough from Drake and the wench, but I think by the time you get out o' here in the spring, you would much rather be with them."

I assured him, however, that he was mistaken, and that I was bent on being a hunter and trapper.

"And an Indian fighter?" he added.