“Oh, we’ll get through,” spoke Billy, quickly. “And the sooner we start the better, before all the grass and fuel are used up. Look at the people, will you, pulling out every day!” “Do you think one wagon will be enough to bring back our gold?” squeaked Left-over, anxiously. “I don’t want to quit till I get a million dollars’ worth for myself alone.” “Then what’ll you do, Left-over?” asked Jim, with a wink at the rest. Left-over Joe scratched his long freckled neck and looked like a chicken. “I’d buy a gun and have all the pie I wanted, too,” he declared foolishly. Now everything had been made ready. The night before the start Billy and Dave spent in camp with the rest of the party. Mr. Shields and family had gone; their log cabin was empty, their claim abandoned again. If they had stayed they could have made lots of money selling produce to the emigrants; but they, like the thousands of others, wished to get rich quick. This last evening in the Salt Creek emigrant camp the party elected their officers. Hi was chosen captain or wagon-master, Billy was chosen lieutenant or assistant, Mr. Baxter volunteered to cook, and “Left-over” was appointed “cavarango” or herder of the two mules. This left Jim and Davy for the general work of march and camp. With the provisions and bedding and mining tools and other stuff the wagon was well loaded for two mules to haul across the plains; so it was decided that all the party except the driver must walk. They would take turns driving and riding; and after the mules were well broken in and the trail was rougher then probably nobody would ride. “I reckon we ought to make twenty miles a day, with mules,” quoth Billy, wisely. “But those oxen the other folks are using won’t make more than twelve or fifteen miles a day. Some of ’em are liable to be sixty days on the road.” “Well, we’ll be lucky if we get through in thirty,” said Mr. Baxter. “It will be nearer forty.” “Do we have to walk forty days?” squealed “Left-over.” “That’s nothing to a bull whacker,” said Hi, gruffly. “I’ve walked clean from Leavenworth to Salt Lake and back again.” “So have I,” nodded Jim. “That’s twelve hundred miles each way――and most of it up-hill, too!” The Smoky Hill Fork trail was to be struck at Fort Riley, 132 miles southwest from Leavenworth. Here the Smoky Hill Fork and the Republican Rivers joined to form the Kaw or Kansas River. Settlements extended to Fort Riley and a short distance beyond; but after that the country was the “Indian Country.” “Lookee here,” suddenly exclaimed Billy Cody, that last night before the start, when everybody was under blankets and almost asleep. “We’ve got to have a name painted on our wagon.” “Can’t we travel anonymous?” queried the Reverend Mr. Baxter, sleepily. “I dunno what that means but it sounds pretty good,” spoke Hi. “Can you spell it?” “Oh,” chuckled Mr. Baxter, “that doesn’t mean anything.” “Huh!” grumbled Hi. “I thought it was an animile like a hippopotamus, mebbe.”