I softly reached for my shotgun, and then lay very quiet, hoping that the band would pass our camp by.  There were three men as I made them out, each riding one horse and leading another.  They had evidently made their way into the creek at some point higher up, and were wading down-stream so as to leave no trail.  Cursing as their mounts plunged into the deep holes in the high water, calling one another and their steeds the vilest of names seemingly as a matter of ordinary conversation, they went on down-stream and out of hearing.  It did not take long for even my slow mind to see that they had come to this grove as I had done, for the purpose of hiding, nor to realize that it might be very unsafe for us to be detected in any discovery of these men in possession of whatever property they might have seized.  It did not seem probable that we should be “nepoed”—­but, after all, why not?  Dead men tell no tales, cattle as well as merchandise were salable; and as for Virginia, I could hardly bring myself to look in the face the dangers to which she might be exposed in this worst case which I found myself conjuring up.

I listened intently for any sound of the newcomers, but everything was as silent as it had been before they had passed like evil spirits of the night; and from this fact I guessed that, they had made camp farther down-stream among the trees.  I stepped to the back of the wagon, and putting in my hand I touched the girl’s hair.  She took my hand in hers, and then dropped it.

“What is it?” she whispered.

“Don’t be scared,” I said, “but be very still.  Some men just went by, and I’m afraid they are bad.”

“Is it that man?” she asked.

“No,” said I, “strangers—­bad characters.  I want them to go on without knowing we’re here.”

She seemed rather relieved at that, and told me that she was not frightened.  Then she asked me where they went.  I told her, and said that when it got lighter I meant to creep after them and see if they were still in the grove.

“Don’t leave me,” said she.  “I reckon I’m a little frightened, after all, and it’s very lonesome in here all alone.  Please get into the wagon with me!”

I said nothing.  Instead I sat for some time on the wagon-tongue and asked myself what I should do, and what she meant by this invitation.  At last I started up, and trembling like a man climbing the gallows, I climbed into the wagon.  There, sitting in the spring seat in the gown she had worn yesterday, with her little shoes on the dashboard, sat Virginia trying to wrap herself in the buffalo-robe.

I folded it around her and took my seat by her side.  With scarcely a whisper between us we sat there and watched the stars wheel over to the west and down to their settings.  At last I felt her leaning over against my shoulder, and found that she was asleep; and softly putting my arms about her outside the warm buffalo-robe, I held her sleeping like a baby until the shrill roundelays of the meadow-larks told me it was morning.