At Junction City we sold our wagon and furs and went with a government mule train to Leavenworth—­arriving there in March, 1860.  I was just able to get around on crutches when I got into Leavenworth, and it was several months after that before I entirely recovered the use of my leg.

During the winter I had often talked to Harrington about my mother and sisters, and had invited him to go home with me in the spring.  I now renewed the invitation, which he accepted, and accompanied me home.  When I related to mother my adventures and told her how Harrington had saved my life, she thanked him again and again.  I never saw a more grateful woman than she was.  She asked him to always make his home with us, as she never could reward him sufficiently for what he had done for her darling boy, as she called me.  Harrington concluded to remain with us through the summer and farm mother’s land.  But alas! the uncertainty of life.  The coming of death when least expected was strikingly illustrated in his case.  During the latter part of April he went to a nursery for some trees, and while coming home late at night he caught a severe cold and was taken seriously sick, with lung fever.  Mother did everything in her power for him.  She could not have done more had he been her own son, but notwithstanding her motherly care and attention, and the skill of a physician from Leavenworth, he rapidly grew worse.  It seemed hard, indeed, to think that a great strong man like Harrington, who had braved the storms, and endured the other hardships of the plains all winter long, should, during the warm and beautiful days of spring, when surrounded by friends and the comforts of a good home, be fatally stricken down.  But such was his fate.  He died one week from the day on which he was taken sick.  We all mourned his loss as we would that of a loved son or brother, as he was one of the truest, bravest, and best of friends.  Amid sorrow and tears we laid him away to rest in a picturesque spot on Pilot Knob.  His death cast a gloom over our household, and it was a long time before it was entirely dispelled.  I felt very lonely without Harrington, and I soon wished for a change of scene again.

CHAPTER VIII.

ADVENTURES ON THE OVERLAND ROAD.

As the warm days of summer approached I longed for the cool air of the mountains; and to the mountains I determined to go.  After engaging a man to take care of the farm, I proceeded to Leavenworth and there met my old wagon-master and friend, Lewis Simpson, who was fitting out a train at Atchison and loading it with supplies for the Overland Stage Company, of which Mr. Russell, my old employer, was one of the proprietors.  Simpson was going with this train to Fort Laramie and points further west.

“Come along with me, Billy,” said he, “I’ll give you a good lay-out.  I want you with me.”

“I don’t know that I would like to go as far west as that again,” replied I, “but I do want to ride the pony express once more; there’s some life in that.”