CHAPTER XVII.

STEALING CRAZY HEAD'S WAR PONIES.

We all got to talking about looking over your shoulder, and the boys asked me if I had ever had to look over my shoulder, and I related to them the following incident in my career on the plains:

In the year 1880-81 the first cattle herds were driven to northern Wyoming and turned loose along Tongue River, Powder River and the Little Horn, and while the Injuns in southern Montana at that time were not very hostile, yet they kept stealing our hosses and butchering the cattlemen's cattle and committing all kinds of petty crimes, and once in a while when they found a white man riding alone in the hills didn't scruple to murder him. But stealing hosses was their long suit. Now, I only had four hosses at that time, and was working out by the month for a cow outfit at $50 a month and board. I thought everything of these four hosses, as they was the sum total of my possessions except about $500 I had due me in wages. And when these hosses was missing one day and a hunter reported seeing a band of Injuns prowling around, I was pretty well worked up. A good many of the settlers in northern Wyoming at that time had had their hosses stolen by the Injuns, but when they found them in the Injuns' possession were unable to get them, as the Injuns refused to give them up and would drive the white men out of their camp. I had always made a loud talk when these men related their experiences, that if ever any Injuns stole my hosses and I found them in their possession I'd take them hosses and no Injun would drive me a step in any direction. So when a freighter reported seeing some Injuns on the Little Horn River, going north with my hosses, the cowboys all said now was the time for me to make good all my loud talk about taking my hosses away from the Injuns if they stole them.

I had considerable trouble to get anyone to go with me, but finally persuaded a boy by the name of King, who was about 17 years old at the time, and getting three hosses from the outfit I worked for, which was the PK cattle outfit, we packed one of the hosses with bed and grub, and riding the other two we struck out north down the Little Horn River. After traveling along the river for several days we crossed and went over on the Big Horn River, and keeping up this river to the Big Horn Mountains, came across about two hundred Injuns camped at the base of the mountains. As soon as we got in sight of their cayuses we saw two of my hosses running with theirs. When we rode into their camp they appeared friendly enough till they found out we wanted these two hosses. I could talk the Injun language, and after making one of the petty chiefs of their band a few little presents, King and I went out to catch our two hosses, but they had been running with the Injuns' cayuses so long we couldn't get near them. Finally we tried to drive them away from the Injuns' cayuses, but about twenty Injuns had come up to us and told us to let the hosses alone and go away. They had their guns, and while they didn't point their guns at me, they kept sticking them against King's breast and threatening to shoot if he didn't go at once. I now offered to pay them if they would catch the two hosses. Every Injun wanted from four to twenty dollars apiece. As there were about twenty Injuns it amounted to about $300. The Injuns rounded up all their cayuses, and getting them in a safe corral, caught my two hosses.

I now instructed King to take the saddle off the hoss he was riding and tie the hoss to the pack-hoss, and I also done this with the one I was riding. We then turned them loose and the three animals immediately started south towards Wyoming. I then told King to saddle one of the hosses that the Injuns had caught for us, but pay no attention to the Injun who was holding it. I saddled the other animal; two Injuns each had a rope on the hoss's neck. When we got them saddled and bridled, I told King to get on his, and I got on mine. The Injuns were standing all around us as well as the squaws and papooses, but they had all laid down their guns. I pulled my Winchester out of the saddle scabbard and throwing a shell in the barrel, I told King to pull his six-shooter and cut the Injun's rope that was on his hoss's neck. He said: "The Injuns will shoot me if I do." I said: "I will shoot you right now if you don't." Although he was very much excited, he managed to pull his knife out of his belt and cut the Injun's rope, and immediately started off after the pack-hoss and saddle hosses on a dead run. The Injuns all set up a howl, and the squaws began bringing the guns out of the teepees. But I kept throwing my Winchester down on first one and then another. The Injuns kept up an awful din hollering to one another, all the squaws yelling to kill the masacheta (white man). But I could hear the chief's voice above them all, telling them not to shoot me. The two Injuns holding the hoss having dropped their ropes, I suddenly threw the ropes off my hoss's neck and reaching down grabbed a papoose, five or six years old, and throwing it up in the saddle with me, galloped away. I knew they wouldn't shoot at me as long as I held to that papoose. But it was like holding on to a full-grown wildcat. I was carrying my Winchester in one hand, guiding my hoss with the same hand and trying to hold on to that little biting, scratching, hair-pulling, shrieking papoose with the other. My hoss was bounding over rocks and sage brush. But he was a magnificent animal and in less time than it takes to tell I was out of gunshot, and then I dropped that shrieking little Injun devil on a sage bush and galloped off in the gathering darkness.

I soon caught up with King. We traveled all night and the next day. Putting him on the trail to Wyoming with all the hosses but the one I was riding, I turned north again to find the other two hosses. That day I met a Piegan Injun that I was acquainted with, and he told me old Crazy Head's band was camped on the Yellowstone River, and that they had my other two hosses and tried to sell them to him.

I rode into Fort Custer and told my story to Jim Dunleavy, the post scout and interpreter, and wanted him to introduce me to the post commander and get me a permit to be on the reservation. But the post commander refused to see me and sent word for me to get off the reservation, or he would put me in the guard house. But I struck out through the hills north, and that afternoon came in sight of Crazy Head's camp. I found an Injun boy herding a large bunch of cayuses about a mile from camp, with my two hosses in the bunch. I rode into the herd and had my hosses roped and tied together before the Injun had recovered from his surprise, and started back south.

But now a new idea took possession of me. Why not steal some Indian cayuses and get even? There was a stage line running through the reservation them days, and I knew the stock tender at the stage ranch, fifteen miles from Fort Custer, at the Fort Custer battle-ground. So waiting till dark I went there, and getting something to eat and leaving the two hosses, I started back to Crazy Head's camp. It was a bright, moonlight night and I found the Injuns' cayuses grazing in the same place. Looking around cautiously I discovered two fine-looking, coal black cayuses grazing by themselves about two hundred yards from the main bunch. Slipping up close to them I threw my rawhide rope over one of them, and, as he was perfectly gentle, started to lead him to a little patch of timber, intending to hobble him and come back and get his mate. But as soon as I started to lead him off, his mate followed him, so I just kept going till I got to the stage station, twenty miles from there, about 3 o'clock in the morning. Getting a bite to eat from the old stock tender and showing him the two cayuses I had stole, he told me he knew the cayuses and that they were old Crazy Head's war ponies.

I had been in the saddle now for twenty-four hours without any rest, but dare not stop a moment, for I knew the Injuns and troops both would be after me as soon as Crazy Head missed his ponies. So necking the two to my other two hosses I started for Wyoming, ninety miles away. The Little Horn River was very high, swimming a hoss from bank to bank, and the stage hadn't been able to get through for some time. The recent rains made the ground soft, and I knew the Injuns would have no trouble tracking me. But they wouldn't miss the ponies till 6 o'clock in the morning, so I would have twenty miles the start and certainly three hours of time. But there was the danger of meeting other Injuns who would know Crazy Head's ponies, and I might meet some scouting soldiers and have to give an account of myself, not having any permit. I didn't mind swimming the Little Horn River, if I hadn't the hosses to drive, but it's hard work for a hoss to swim in a swift current where the waves out about the middle are running big and high, as they do in mountain streams, and drive some loose hosses. But I made the hosses all plunge in and started for the other shore, two hundred yards away. They all swam like ducks at first crossing, but I would have to swim the river seven times if I kept the valley, and knew I would lose time if I went through the hills. So I kept on in a tireless lope, mile after mile, and all the time looking back over my shoulder.

Now I knew the Injuns couldn't be in twenty miles of me, but nevertheless I kept looking over my shoulder to make sure, and I looked ahead, and every moving bush along the stream looked like a soldier or an Injun, and every jackrabbit that jumped up side the road, every sage hen that flew out the grass and startled my hosses nearly made me jump out of my skin. Everything that moved in the distance looked like old Crazy Head to me. Talk about looking over your shoulder, boys; why, my neck got in the shape of a corkscrew. Then I came to another crossing of the river. I never stopped to look at the high rolling black waters, but plunged my hosses in and struck out for the other side. I again made it in safety, and stopping just long enough to tighten my saddle cinches, took another look over my shoulder and hit that lope again and made up my mind I wouldn't be caught. But supposing I was caught, what kind of a story could I tell? And so I tried to figure out a defense for being found with them two black hosses. I couldn't think of anything or any story but what looked fishy and showed I was a thief, and it seemed as if every one else would know it. I remember after I became an officer of the law, several years after this event happened, I caught a poor devil skinning a beef one day that didn't belong to him, and as I rode up on him and told him to turn the beef over so I could see the brand, he dropped his skinning knife and looking up at me with guilt and terror in his face, he says, "You know how it is yourself." And I said, "Yes, Bill, I know how it is. I was a thief once, but the people are paying me now to uphold the law. Besides I stole Injun hosses and you are stealing white men's beef." And then at the memory of my ride on the Little Horn that day I looked over my shoulder again, and when I looked back for Bill he was gone, and somehow I was kind of glad, for I had a fellow feeling for him.

But to return to my story. When I had swum the Little Horn the fourth time I was forty miles on my journey, and while the iron grey Oregon hoss I was riding seemed as fresh as ever, the black Indian ponies seemed to be getting tired. When I struck the next ford on the river I was fifty miles on the way and it was only 9 o'clock. I was feeling pretty good. But this time when we got out about the middle of the river where the waves were high and rolling, one of the Injun ponies stopped swimming and commenced to float down stream with his nose in the water and dragging the one he was necked to with him. I started after them and by a good deal of urging got my hoss alongside, and throwing my rope on them finally towed them ashore. The pony laid in the shallow water at the shore for a long time, and I thought he was dead, but he finally came to and got up. But he was full of water and pretty groggy.

I found the other two, and getting them together again started on, but knew I would have to take to the hills now when I came to the river again, which I did, and hadn't rode over five miles in the hills skirting the river till, coming up on a high divide and looking down in the valley of the river, I saw a camp of five or six hundred Injuns; but they didn't see me, and I kept on till I came to Owl Creek, which empties into the Little Horn, and it was bank full of cream-colored, muddy water. The banks were steep and I couldn't guess at the depth of the water, which was of the consistency of gumbo soup. However, I drove the hosses into it, first having untied them from one another, as the buffalo trail going down into it was very narrow. As each hoss plunged in he went completely out of sight, and I couldn't guess how far he went under water. But they all clambered up on the other bank, and I see I had got to follow them, so plunged in. As my hoss jumped off that high bank, I grabbed my nose and under that yellow water we went. It seemed like we never would find the bottom, but finally did, and came back to the surface and scrambled up the bank. My fine buckskin shirt and leggings made but a sorry appearance. My six-shooter and holster were full of yellow mud the same as my Winchester, and it took me an hour to clean my guns and get that yellow mud off my hat and clothes. But I had no more streams to cross, except Tongue River, which is in Wyoming, and I crossed it a little after dark and got to my own ranch at 9 o'clock that evening, having ridden the same hoss one hundred and six miles since 3 o'clock that morning.

That grey hoss is still living and is 30 years old now, and is well known by all the old-timers in northern Wyoming. I laid down and slept for twenty hours, and when I reported at the roundup with my four hosses and the two Injun ponies besides, I got a hearty handshake all around. The boys made up a pot of a hundred dollars and gave it to me for the Injun ponies, and then played a game of freeze-out to see who should have them.

I've never had the least inclination to look over my shoulder since.