Murmured comment by teamsters, here and there among the wagons, showed to Oliver that he was not alone in his disappointment.
“That leetle feller, with the captain yon?”
“Wall, naow, I thought Kit Carson war some punkins!”
“A big Injun’s liable to pick him right up!”
But Dan Matthews, Captain Blunt’s first lieutenant, came hurrying, from point to point in the circle.
“Turn out your critters, men; and you guards post yourselves as before. Lively. There’s likely no danger to-night, Carson says; but keep your eyes and ears open, jest the same.”
“Is that thar reely Kit Carson――that leetle chap?” queried Teamster Henry, as the camp bustled to resume its routine.
“Wall, he’s the smallest pea for the amount of pod ever _I_ see!”
“Don’t you be fooled, Henry,” retorted Lieutenant Matthews. “You wait a bit, and if you don’t find that he’s got the biggest _do_ for the size of his _tell_ that ever you ran across, I’ll eat my hat.”
“That’s right,” affirmed “Dutch” Jake, overhearing. “Brag’s a good dog but he won’t fight; an’ you mustn’t jedge a race-hoss by the color of his hide. You’re seeing one Kit Carson, a gentle-speaking, mild-appearing, sort o’ nincompoop who you might think didn’t know beans. But there’s another Kit Carson, half hoss an’ half alligator, as they say on the Mississippi, or half grizzly b’ar an’ half charging elk, as _I_ say; an’ I reckon you’ll see him, too, ’fore we’re through Injun country.”
These words of “Dutch” Jake impressed Oliver deeply, for Jake spoke as if he knew. At any rate, ’twas pleasant to have the reinforcements: to watch their easy figures, to hear their voices, to stroll through their camp and catch their conversation, to note their fringed, beaded clothing, their worn weapons, and their wildly shaggy faces; and to feel their presence, so handy, when in the darkness the fires died and both camps went to sleep.
All the next day the march proceeded, southward from the Arkansas, amidst sand hills and sparse vegetation. The trappers from Taos rode in a line along either side of the train, with scouts ahead and out upon the flanks. The men of the train laughed and talked, bantering back and forth. And behind, in the reek of the procession, boy Oliver, ragged and upon his old mule, driving the cavvy, strained eye and ear to keep tab upon what was being done and said. At the noon camp he had opportunity to scan, close by daylight, Kit Carson again.