Business had now begun in earnest, and we would soon be enjoying a steady income, to offset our winter's expenses. Where buffaloes were as plentiful as they were here I could easily kill enough in a day to keep ten skinners busily at work. I killed enough next day to keep "Frenchy" and Armitage employed for several days, and went down to Adobe Walls in a light wagon, to see if I could hire more skinners. I found one man who would go with me, but for only a few days, until his partner should return with a load of hides. All the other hunters had heard the good news, and had pulled out for the buffalo range. Adobe Walls was deserted, save for the merchants and their clerks. By offering this man twenty-five cents a hide for skinning, I induced him to go with me for a week or ten days. On my way I had undertaken to pick out the most direct route from my camp to Adobe Walls. Keeping on the divide between Dixon Creek and Short Creek, I came to a stretch of very rough country late in the evening, and finally reached a place where it was impossible to travel further in a wagon. As darkness was falling, I unhooked my mules, Tobe and Joe, and jumped astride old Tobe, followed some buffalo trails down to Dixon Creek, near its mouth where grass and water were abundant. As this particular locality was new to me and darkness at hand, I decided that I would camp there for the night. Picketing one of the mules, I turned the other one loose. With a single blanket for my bed and my coat for a pillow, I lay down for the night, and was soon sound asleep. No mercy was shown the buffaloes when I got back to camp from Adobe Walls. I killed as many as my three men could handle, working them as hard as they were willing to work. This was deadly business, without sentiment; it was dollars against tenderheartedness, and dollars won. When the man I had hired at Adobe Walls had worked his full time, I hitched up and started back with him. When we reached the Canadian we found her with her back up, smashing and banging things from side to side--so deep and swollen that it would have been the height of foolishness to attempt a crossing. We went on to White Deer Creek, hoping to find a wider crossing, and by reason of it a shallower bottom. I waded the river in my search for a good footing, and decided finally that we could cross by swimming the mules fifty or sixty yards. It was our purpose to unhitch the mules and leave the wagon on the south side of the river until the water had run down. Our plans were quickly changed. At that moment two men from Adobe Walls rode up and told us that two hunters had been killed by Indians twenty-five miles down the river, on Chicken Creek, several days past. Our informants were greatly excited, and were hurrying back to their camp at the head of White Deer.