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from having rolled off his bedroll.
    â€œDamn,” he swore, “I’m gonna have to go in the river again.”
    â€œI don’t know about you, partner,” Riley stated. “But I’m thinkin’ I’d like to get my clothes back on and get the hell outta here, even if it is in the middle of the night. I swear, this damn spot is bad luck.”
    â€œI won’t argue with you this time,” Joel declared, thinking that he should have gone along with Riley’s suggestion to leave the camp before. “Those two might not be the only ones thinkin’ about payin’ us a visit.”
    Their uniforms were still not totally dry, but they put them on just the same, packed up their camp, and put out the fire. Then they went back beyond the trees to collect the two ponies left there by the Comanche, stripped the Indian saddles off, and left them on the ground. The two extra horses might prove to be an additional bother, but they decided they might as well take them since they could be used to trade for supplies or ammunition. The horses, one a paint, the other a gray, weren’t particularly anxious to go with the white men, and tried to pull away when Riley approached with a rope. He figured it was most likely the strange smell of the white men, so Joel threw one of the Indian saddle blankets over the paint’s head, rubbing it gently on the horse’s face until it calmed down. The same treatment worked on the gray as well, at least well enough to enable them to fashion a lead rope to be tied to each of the packhorses. All this was done as quickly as possible, with each man frequently pausing to scan the stand of cottonwoods behind them. When all was ready, they left the river, heading out across the dark prairie in the same direction they had followed for the last several days.
    Sometime during the wee hours of the morning, they reached another river winding through the almost flat terrain. It was a rough guess, but they estimated that they had ridden about twenty miles from the Canadian, so they decided to make camp and rest the horses. The spot where they struck the river offered little in the way of firewood, since the banks were crowded with berry thickets but no trees. Concerned more with catching a little sleep, however, they chose to roll up in their blankets and worry about a fire in the morning.
    Daylight brought a clear sky and the sun peeking up across a prairie that appeared as wide and flat as a gigantic skillet. But as far as Joel could see, and that seemed like forever, there was no sign of any other being.
    â€œI don’t reckon there was any more of them Injuns that decided to come after us,” Riley announced when he returned from the bushes with an armload of dead branches. “Good thing, ’cause there ain’t a helluva lot of places to hide.”
    â€œWe’ll fix some breakfast and head on outta here,” Joel said. “I wanna take a better look at those Indian ponies we picked up next time we stop.”
    The captured horses seemed to have settled in with the others, and no longer resisted being led. They rode for half a day before stopping again to rest and water the horses. After some bacon and coffee, Joel and Riley looked their newly acquired stock over carefully and came to the conclusion that they had gained two pretty good horses, neither one more than about four years old. Joel especially liked the gray.
    â€œWhen we get a little more of the dust of this prairie behind us, I think I’d like to see if I can throw a saddle on that one.”
    For the present, however, the two Indian ponies were led behind the packhorses as they set out for Colorado Territory.

Chapter 3
    Almost two weeks had passed since they left the Canadian River when they made camp outside Denver City. The journey would have taken less time, but they had the good fortune to come upon a herd of deer near the Arkansas River, and were able to catch them at