With a final dodge, Shep tore the moccasin loose and carried it under the cart. Glaring a moment at the cart, at Terry, at Harry, Thunder Horse, scowling blackly, rode on. The four Arapahoes, laughing among themselves, followed. The way with which Shep had astonished Thunder Horse amused them greatly. The next noon, when the Pike's Peak Limited passed the stage station, the agent hailed with the question: "Say! Was it your dog that bit that Kiowa in the foot?" "Yes. He'd tried to steal from the cart." "Well, served him right. 'Twasn't much of a bite, but he had a powerful sore foot when he and those 'Rapahoes went out this mornin'. They camped here all night." "Teeth scurcely broke the skin; but he's been so pizened with whiskey that any least scratch on him's liable to make a bad sore," added the agent's helper. "Did two men with a team and a wagon get here in a hurry, yesterday evening?" asked Harry. "Ahead of the Indians?" "Yes, sir!" laughed the agent. "Those hunter greenhorns, you mean, flying from a massacre? We calmed 'em down, let 'em hide in the tent, and told 'em if they'd stay behind the massacre it wouldn't catch 'em. So they waited until the massacre left, then they left." For the next week and more the Pike's Peak Limited kept hearing, from station to station, of Thunder Horse and his sore foot. His foot had swollen, his leg had swollen to the knee, it had swollen above the knee, it was still swelling--and he was very surly, and evidently in much pain, and drunk whenever he could obtain any liquor. The hunters' wagon disappeared, between stations, as if on a short-cut to the Republican; and soon thereafter the Chief Little Raven squad, including the then much distressed Thunder Horse (whose leg, said the last agent, ought to be cut off), disappeared also. The Pike's Peak Limited plodded along. At some time every day a stage or two stages from Leavenworth on the Missouri River passed, usually full, but occasionally half empty. The Valley of the Republican was close before, and behind was pressing nearer the van of that great procession. "They're beginning to raise a dust," remarked Harry, gazing back. "Yes; but you can see a dust ahead, too," said Terry. "Hope we get there first." That night the camp-fires of the leading outfits on the trail behind were plainly visible, winking through the darkness; and down in the broad Republican Valley scattered other camp-fires were winking. "An early start for us in the morning, remember," enjoined Harry. It was almost noon when, just beating a faster-stepping team trying to overtake, the Pike's Peak Limited, first pilgrim outfit through by the new stage route, filed into the well-trodden, dusty trail made now by stage and gold-seekers combined up the wide valley of the Republican. "Hee-haw!" exulted Jenny; but Duke the half-buffalo only flirted his little tail at sight of the new company. CHAPTER VIII THE TRAIL GROWS LIVELY