Part 17

The station swiftly enlarged. A poor place it was, Dave remembered: a low log cabin, sod roofed, with rude log stable close behind it, and a pole corral. The station man would be about as rude in appearance: unshaven, well weathered, dressed in slouch hat, rough flannel shirt, red or blue, belted trousers and heavy boots. There he lived, by the roadside, 700 miles into the Indian country, alone amidst the unpeopled, rolling sagy hills through which flowed the North Platte River and extended, unending, the ribbon-like road. Dave could see him standing in front of the buildings, holding the relay horse and peering down the trail for its rider. The stations were required by the company to have the fresh horse saddled and bridled and ready half an hour before the express was due.

Dave knew his duty, too. Not slackening pace, he loosened from the fastenings the saddle bags under him. Up at full gallop he dashed, and even before he had pulled his pony to its haunches, he tore the saddle bags from beneath him and tossed them ahead. Then he was off in a twinkling, staggering as he landed.

“Quick!” he gasped, out of parched throat.

The station man had stared, but he grabbed the saddle bags.

“Who are you? Where’s Tom?”

“Hurt. Coming on stage.”

The saddle bags were clapped on the other saddle. Dave grasped the bridle lines.

“Bad?”

“Leg broken.” And Davy, thrusting foot into stirrup, vaulted aboard almost over the station man’s head.

One last twitch to the saddle bags.

“What’s the news?”

“Lincoln’s elected. New York gives him fifty thousand majority.” And away sprang Dave, headlong on the next leg of his route.

Thudding through the sand, clattering over the rocks, echoing through short defiles, ever urging his pony, rode Davy. He was resolved to go clear through, to the home station at Red Buttes, over sixty miles. The stations ahead had no means of knowing that an accident had befallen the regular rider; and to mount another substitute, at short notice, would consume valuable time. At Red Buttes Billy Cody would take the saddle bags――and to give them to Billy he must.

At the next station, fourteen miles, the station man had helpers in the shape of two hostlers or stable hands. They also gazed, astonished at sight of Dave instead of Irish Tom; but no one wasted precious moments in explanations. The conversation was much the same as before――and on his fresh horse Dave spurred again up the long, long trail. He passed a toiling bull train. “Lincoln’s elected,” he shrieked as before; but he was going so fast that he did not catch their response. He only noted them wave their whips in salute.

Horseshoe Station hove into view. This was headquarter’s station for the division. Here stayed, when not on the trail, Mr. Slade, the division superintendent; and he was in front of the station cabin with the other men, peering down the road.

Davy galloped in. He was assailed by a volley of queries――until Mr. Slade cut them short.

“No matter,” he bade curtly. “Fasten that mochila. Now ride, my lad; you’re half an hour late!”

“Lincoln’s elected,” gasped Davy, spurring away.

He was getting tired. His feet were growing numb, and his ankles were being chafed raw. Before he arrived at the next station, the Platte River had to be forded. As he passed through, a man sprang into sight, in the trail at the farther bank. Dave’s heart leaped into his throat. The man was partially screened by willows. He was armed. With ears pricked, the horse forged ahead, and the man waited. To leave the stream bed required a little climb up the rather steep bank, and as Dave reached it out whipped the man’s revolver and the muzzle was trained true at Dave. It seemed to him that the round hole covered every inch of his body. His horse shied and balked.

“Throw off that mail bag.”

The man was “Yank,” assistant wagon boss under Charley Martin! Dave recognized him at once, although the slouch hat was pulled low. But beneath the brim the eyes were those of “Yank.”

“No,” panted Dave, trying to hold his voice steady and think of what Billy Cody or Irish Tom would do. “It’s only election news.”

“Throw off that mail and be quick, too,” ordered “Yank,” with a string of curses.

Hardly knowing what he did, but resolved to do something, Dave plunged his spurs into his pony’s heaving flanks. With a great snort and a long leap the pony lunged forward straight up the bank. “Yank” uttered a sudden vicious exclamation and dived aside; but the horse’s shoulder struck him, hurled him aside, and at the instant veering sharply into the fringe of willows Dave sent his mount crashing through. The willows slapped him in the face and on the body. He bent low――in a moment more they were out of the willows, again into the trail, and tearing onward. He heard a shot――just one; but the bullet went wide, and thudity, thudity, he was galloping safe. A little shaky, Dave laughed; he felt like giving a whoop――although he could not spare breath for even that. He imagined, though, how mad “Yank” must be, and this was what had made him laugh.

Even with the excitement of the hold-up that failed, the road began to seem wearisome, the ride one monotonous pound. The chafing stirrups tortured his ankles almost beyond endurance――but not quite; no, not quite. The saddle chafed his thighs. His mouth was parched, he could scarcely breathe; he could scarcely see, when, ever and anon, his head swam giddily. He forded the river again. From throbbing pain, his ankles changed to the relief of numbness, and his feet, blistered, and his blistered thighs gradually ceased to be his; they felt as if they belonged to somebody else.

He had vague recollection of arriving at the way stations, of staggering from horse to horse, of being helped into the saddle, of voices hailing him, and hands and voices forwarding him on again. Once he passed the east-bound stage――and again he passed it, or another: and he piped to the staring faces: “Lincoln’s elected. New York gives fifty thousand majority.” The words issued mechanically, and he did not know what effect they had.

He had vague recollection that a bevy of Indians yelled at him and flourished their bows, and that he heard the hiss of arrows travelling even faster than he; but he could not stop to argue. The one fact that stuck in his mind was that he was nearly on time. “Three minutes late,” he thought that somebody said at the last station where he changed horses. And――“Go it, lad! You’re a plucky one.”

“Three minutes late” was all. The thought buoyed him up and glued him to his saddle. Gallop, gallop, over rock and sand, through brush and through the bare open and through occasional scrubby growth of trees; through shaded canyons, and through the burning, windy sunshine.

Was that Red Buttes? Was that really Red Buttes at last――the end of his trip, where waited Billy Cody? Supposing Billy wasn’t there; would they want _him_ to continue riding, riding, forever? He uttered a little sob of despair, but he set his teeth hard, and resolved that he’d do it; he’d do it, if he _had_ to.

The road was hilly and his horse flagged. He spurred ruthlessly and struck with his hat. If he did not arrive on time he would be ashamed, for nobody could know how hard he had tried. Up the hill he forced his pony and would not let him relax into a trot. Down the grade he galloped――every forward jump a torment. Red Buttes――that _must_ be Red Buttes――wavered strangely amidst the level expanse before. But he reached it. At least he thought that he reached it, and he fumbled at his saddle bags to loosen them.

Somebody rushed forward as if to meet him and help him; and he saw, lined plainly amidst the confused other countenances and figures, the astonished face of Billy.

“It’s Red! Look out! He’ll fall off!” Billy’s voice rang like a trumpet.

“Where’s the regular man?” they demanded.

“Tom’s hurt――away back. I took his place. Quick, Billy! Go on. Election news. Lincoln’s elected.”

Billy vented an exclamation. He was into the saddle atop the saddle bags; he sprang away.

“Take good care of that kid,” he called back. “He’s a good one.”

“You bet we will.”

“Am I on time?” wheezed Davy, vaguely, unable to see straight.

“Two minutes ahead of time, lad.”

Then they picked up Davy and carried him in, for he had fallen. He felt that he was entitled to fall. Besides, he could not have walked to save his life, now that he was done with the saddle bags.

XXIII

A BRUSH ON THE OVERLAND STAGE

Davy was so stiff and sore that for several days he moved around very little; but he learned that the news which he had brought in was being rushed westward at a tremendous rate. Billy Cody had ridden the last ten miles of his own run in thirty minutes; and by special rider from Julesburg the tidings “Lincoln’s elected!” had been taken into Denver only two days and twenty-one hours out of St. Joseph――665 miles.

When Davy was on his way back to Laramie he heard, at Horseshoe Station, that the news had been carried through to California in eight days――two days less than schedule! That was riding! And although he never again was on Pony Express, he felt that to the end of his life he would be proud of having ridden it once and of having performed well.

The people at Fort Laramie appreciated what Davy had done, and if he had not been a sensible boy the praise that he got would have turned his head. Captain Brown it was who summoned him over to the Brown quarters one evening and asked flatly:

“Dave, how would you like to go to West Point and be educated for a soldier?”

Dave gulped, in surprise, and blushed red. Such an education had been beyond his dreams.

“You have the right stuff in you, boy,” continued the captain, eyeing him. “You’ve made a good start, but you can’t continue knocking around this way. The frontier won’t last forever. When the telegraph comes through, connecting the West with the East, the Pony Express will have to quit; and there’ll soon be a railroad, and then the stage coach business will have to quit. If we have war (and things look like it), I’ll be ordered out; so will the other officers and men here, and what will happen to you is a problem. See? If you want to go to West Point you ought to begin preparing, so as to be ready when you’re old enough to enter. It’s no easy matter to take the course at the Academy; but it’s the finest education in the world, even if you don’t stay in the army. I don’t want you to go there with the idea of being a fighting man. Army officers are the last persons of all to wish for fighting. The army has a great work to do outside of war. We’re supposed to civilize the country and keep it peaceful. At West Point your body is built up, and what you learn, you learn thoroughly. You come out fit to meet every kind of emergency. What do you say? If you say ‘yes,’ then I’ll make application for you to the President direct and ask him to appoint you ‘at large,’ as he has a right to do, just as if you were my own son.”

“Yes, sir,” stammered Davy, red. “I’d like to go.”

“Good!” exclaimed the captain, shaking with him. “I’ll make arrangements so that if I’m ordered out you’ll be in the right hands.”

Events seemed to occur fast. By Pony Express dispatches and the tissue newspapers it was learned that South Carolina had withdrawn from the Union and that the other Southern States were following suit. Abraham Lincoln in his inauguration address besought peace but stood firmly for a United States. His address was carried from Saint Joseph to Sacramento, 1966 miles, in seven days and seventeen hours――a new record. But when arrived the word that on April 12 the South Carolina troops had bombarded Fort Sumter, then everybody knew that the war had begun.

Another important thing, also, occurred. Before spring a stranger who created considerable talk came through by stage bound west. He was Mr. Edward Creighton――a pleasant gentleman with an Irish face; and was on his way to Salt Lake looking over the country with a view to putting in a telegraph line through to Salt Lake City. A California company was to build from California east to Salt Lake and it was rumored that the Government offered a payment of $40,000 a year to the company that reached Salt Lake the first. This meant, of course, a line clear across from the Missouri to the Pacific coast.

In the hurly-burly of troops preparing to leave for the front in the East, Davy had the idea that he, too, should go as a drummer boy, maybe. The sight of Billy Cody hurrying through was hard to bear.

Billy appeared unexpectedly on the stage from Horseshoe Station, where he had been an “extra” rider under direct orders of Superintendent Jack Slade himself.

“Hello, Billy!”

“Hello, Dave.”

“Where are you going now, Billy?”

“Back home. I haven’t been home for a year, and my mother wants to see me. She’s poorly again. I guess I’d better be where things are boiling, too. This war won’t last more than six months, they say; but Kansas is liable to be a hot place with so many Southerners just across the border in Missouri. I ought to be on hand in case of trouble around home.”

That was just like Billy――to be on hand! Dave had more than half a mind to accompany him to Leavenworth, and Captain Brown, about to leave himself, had about decided that Leavenworth would be the best place, when the matter was solved by the appearance of the Reverend Mr. Baxter, who arrived on the next stage from the west.

“Gee whillikins!” exclaimed Dave, overjoyed, rushing to meet him. “What are _you_ doing here?”

“Oh, merely coming through on my way from Salt Lake back to Denver,” laughed Mr. Baxter. “I’m messenger on the stage between Julesburg and Denver, but I’ve been off on a little vacation with a survey party for a new stage road. I heard you were here. You’re celebrated since you made that splendid ride, Davy.”

Davy blushed again. He hated to blush, but he had to.

“What are you doing these days?” demanded Mr. Baxter.

As soon as he heard of Davy’s plans and present fix, he insisted that Davy travel down to Denver with him and stay there.

“Room with me, Dave?” he proffered generously. “I need a bunky. You can get work easy enough――I know the very place where they can use a boy who can write and figure――and I’ll tutor you. It will do me good to brush up a little in mathematics and all that.”

Captain Brown agreed, and the matter was promptly settled. Away went Dave, and the next day Captain Brown himself left for Fort Leavenworth, and then――where? His going would have made Laramie rather empty for Dave.

Denver had grown amazingly. There was now no “Auraria”; all was Denver City――and what had been known as “Western Kansas” and the “Territory of Jefferson,” was the Territory of Colorado. On both sides of Cherry Creek many new buildings, two and three stories, some of the buildings being brick, had gone up; potatoes and other produce were being raised, and the streets, busier than ever, were thronged with merchants and other real citizens, as well as with miners and bull whackers.

Mr. Baxter took Davy over to see the lots that they had bought for the sack of flour two years before. Then, the lots had been out on the very edge of town; now they were right in the business district. The Jones family had not cared for them; had sold them for a mere song and had pushed on to “get rich quick” mining. The Joneses had gone back to the States, poor; but the lost lots were being held by the present owners at $1000 apiece.

Mr. Baxter made good his promise, and Dave found a niche (which appeared to have been made especially for a red-headed boy, with spunk, who could read and write as well as take care of himself on the trail) in the Elephant Corral. This was a large store building and yard for the convenience of merchants and overland traffic. It dealt in flour and feed and other staples consigned to it, and was headquarters for bull outfits arriving and leaving.

The war excitement continued. Colorado, like Kansas and Nebraska, sent out its volunteers in response to the calls of President Lincoln. Mr. Baxter tried hard to be accepted as a chaplain, but the examining surgeons refused him, he confided to Davy, because he had a “bum lung.”

“So, Davy boy,” he said, “you and I will have to fight the battle of peace, and win our honors there, at present.”

They heard that Captain Brown had been made a general, and Billy Cody and Wild Bill, too, were serving on the Union side as scouts and despatch bearers in Kansas and Missouri. As for Davy, he pegged along, rooming and boarding with Mr. Baxter, doing his work at the Elephant Corral and studying evenings.

Meanwhile, the staging and freighting across the plains and to Salt Lake continued, when not interrupted by the Indians. The Butterfield “Southern Overland,” through Texas and New Mexico and Arizona to California, which had been carrying the Government mail for two years, had to be discontinued on account of the war and the Apache Indians; and the contract was given to the “Central” route, operated by Russell, Majors & Waddell. This meant $400,000 a year from the Government, and it looked as though the Central Overland, California & Pike’s Peak need no longer be called the “Clean Out of Cash & Poor Pay”; but soon the word came that the whole line had been bought in by a big creditor, Ben Holladay.

Great things were expected of Ben Holladay. Dave had seen him once or twice――a large, heavy man, with square, resolute face; clean-shaven cheeks, and gray beard. He was a veteran freighter and trader on the plains, and had been in business in Salt Lake, California, St. Louis and New York, and was a hustler. He hastened to increase the service of his stage line. No expense or trouble was too much for him. The line was known now as “Ben Holladay’s Line,” and “The Overland Stage.” The old route north from Julesburg and around by Fort Laramie was changed to a shorter route (the route which Mr. Baxter had helped survey for Russell, Majors & Waddell at the time when he picked up Dave at Laramie), which from Latham, sixty miles north of Denver, veering northwest crossed the mountains at Bridger’s Pass for Salt Lake. At Salt Lake the celebrated Pioneer Stage Line continued with passengers and mail and express for Placerville, California.

The very fall after Dave arrived in Denver Mr. Creighton finished his telegraph line into Salt Lake City, and won the $40,000 a year prize offered by the Government. The California company met him there; the first message was flashed through from coast to coast (“The Pacific to the Atlantic sends greeting,” it said; “and may both oceans be dry before a foot of all the land that lies between shall belong to any other than a united country”); and, as Captain Brown had predicted, the Pony Express must stop. The Holladay stages carried the mails.

Every morning at eight o’clock sharp they left Atchison below St. Joseph on the Missouri River; at Latham the Salt Lake coaches proceeded on to Salt Lake and the Denver coaches turned south to Denver――and usually got in with such regularity that Denver people set their watches by them! There never had been such a stage coach magnate as Ben Holladay. His six- and nine-passenger Concord coaches were the best that could be built――and on the main line alone he used 100. His horses were the best that could be bought――and of these and of mules he had, on the main line, 3000. His drivers were paid the best salaries――$125 and $150 a month. And for carrying the mails he received from the Government $650,000 a year. When, several times a year, he went over his whole lines he travelled like a whirlwind and caused a tremendous commotion.

But speedily the regular operation of the Holladay Overland Express was badly interrupted, for the Indians began to ravage up and down. All the way from central Kansas to the mountains they destroyed stations and attacked stages. The stages ran two at a time, for company, and were protected by squads of soldiers; but even then they did not always get through, and Denver was cut off from the outside world for weeks at a time. Whenever Mr. Baxter started out as messenger Dave was afraid that he would not come back alive; but somehow he managed to make the trip, although he was apt to return in a coach riddled with arrows and bullets.

The summer of 1864, when Davy was almost seventeen and old enough to enter the Military Academy, was the worst season of all for Indian raids. Stations and ranches for hundreds of miles at a stretch were pillaged, and the stages ceased altogether between the mountains and the Missouri. Then, in the fall, there came a lull――of which Dave was heartily glad, for he had been ordered to report at Fort Leavenworth for examination. His appointment had come, signed by Abraham Lincoln.

“I’ll see you through to Atchison, Dave,” said Mr. Baxter; “and to Leavenworth, too. The return trip will be my last run.”

“Why so, Ben?” asked Davy, astonished.

“Because I’m going to change to a more permanent business while I can. The railways are coming. The Central Pacific’s building a little every year east out of California, and as soon as the war’s over the Union Pacific will start from its end, at the Missouri. When the two roads meet, with trains running across the continent, this staging business will be knocked flat, and we messengers will be stranded. I’ve got my health now; I’m as good a man as anybody, and when I get back from Atchison I’ll go into something different. I’ve several offers pending. See?”

That sounded like sense; but Dave was pleased that Mr. Baxter had not quit before this trip, for he had counted on going out in Ben’s coach.

The fare from Denver to the Missouri River was up to $175, but Davy had saved this, and more. The stages left from the Planters’ Hotel. The first stage out, after the long interruption, created much excitement. At least fifty passengers clamored for places, but there was room for only nine in the body――and even they were crowded by mail sacks. Dave sat on the driver’s box with Ben and the driver, who was Bob Hodge.

Everybody on the line knew Bob Hodge; he was one of the “king whips,” and very popular. The Holladay stage drivers out of the principal stations dressed the best that they could, for they were persons of consequence. Polished boots, broadcloth trousers tucked in, soft silk shirts with diamond stud, rakish hat and kid gloves were none too good for them. Bob wore a suit of buckskin――with its decorations of beads and fringes, the finest suit in Denver. As he stepped from the hotel he elegantly drew on a pair of new yellow kid gloves. He nodded to Ben and Dave, and tucked a brass horn, which was his pride, in the seat. On this horn he was accustomed to perform when he wanted amusement and when he approached stations. His other pride was his whip――of ebony handle inlaid with silver. All the Holladay stage drivers owned their whips and would not lend them.

Bob climbed aboard, Ben and Dave followed. Two hostlers held the six-horse team by the bits; another handed up the lines to Bob――who condescended to receive them.

“Think she’ll get through, Bob?” queried several voices, referring to the coach.

“Oh, I reckon. She’s been through several times before,” drawled Bob.

And by the looks of “her,” she evidently had been through something. It had been a beautiful coach, in the beginning, painted a glossy bright green, trimmed with gilt; but now it was scarred by storm and Indians. The very boot curtain behind Dave’s feet was punctured in two places by arrows, and there were other holes through the coach sides.

Bob glanced at his gold watch. He grasped lines and whip, nodded at the hostlers (they sprang from the leaders’ bits), released the heavy brake with a bang; to the crack of his whip forward leaped the six gray horses, whose harness was adorned with ivory rings. The watching crowd gave a cheer, and, driving with one hand, Bob played what he called “Into the Wilderness.”