On a long journey through wild country strangers grow close together or far apart.  Bill Horn did not think much of the men who had accepted the chance he offered them, and daily he grew more aloof.  They were not a responsible crowd, and the best he could get out of them was the driving of oxen and camp chores indifferently done.  He had to kill the meat and find the water and keep the watch.  Upon entering the Wyoming hills region Horn showed a restlessness and hurry and anxiety.  This in no wise affected the others.  They continued to be aimless and careless as men who had little to look forward to.

This beautiful valley offered everything desirable for a camp site except natural cover or protection in case of attack.  But Horn had to take the risk.  The oxen were tired, the wagons had to be greased, and it was needful to kill meat.  Here was an abundance of grass, a clear brook, wood for camp-fires, and sign of game on all sides.

“Haul round—­make a circle!” Horn ordered the drivers of the oxen.

This was the first time he had given this particular order, and the men guffawed or grinned as they hauled the great, clumsy prairie-schooners into a circle.  The oxen were unhitched; the camp duffle piled out; the ring of axes broke the stillness; fires were started.

Horn took his rifle and strode away up the brook to disappear in the green brush of a ravine.

It was early in the evening, with the sun not yet out of sight behind a lofty ridge that topped the valley slope.  High grass, bleached white, shone brightly on the summit.  Soon several columns of blue smoke curled lazily aloft until, catching the wind high up, they were swept away.  Meanwhile the men talked at their tasks.

“Say, pard, did you come along this here Laramie Trail goin’ West?” asked one.

“Nope.  I hit the Santa Fe Trail,” was the reply.

“How about you, Jones?”

“Same fer me.”

“Wal,” said another, “I went round to California by ship, an’ I’d hev been lucky to drown.”

“An’ now we’re all goin’ back poorer than when we started,” remarked a third.

“Pard, you’ve said somethin’.”

“Wal, I seen a heap of gold, if I didn’t find any.”

“Jones, has this here Bill Horn any gold with him?”

“He acts like it,” answered Jones.  “An’ I heerd he struck it rich out thar.”

The men appeared divided in their opinions of Bill Horn.  From him they drifted to talk of possible Indian raids and scouted the idea; then they wondered if the famous Pony Express had been over this Laramie Trail; finally they got on the subject of a rumored railroad to be built from East to West.

“No railroad can’t be built over this trail,” said Jones, bluntly.

“Sure not.  But couldn’t more level ground be dug?” asked another.

“Dug?  Across them Utah deserts an’ up them mountains?  Hell!  Men sure hev more sense than thet,” exclaimed the third.