They knew that the fight would be short and hot, so with the Pawnee between them they arrived at the entrance.  Now the Sioux evidently heard them, and came rushing out, but it was too late!  The Pony Express men opened fire, and two of the savages bit the dust.  They returned the salute, but with such careless aim that their shots were perfectly harmless; but as the white men fired again, two more of the savages fell, and only two were left.  The rider got a shot in the shoulder, but he kept on with his revolver despite his pain, while the boss, who had fired all his shots, was compelled to throw the empty weapon into the persistent savage’s face, while Little Cayuse kept peppering the other with small shot from his rifle.

Then the Indian at whom the boss had thrown his revolver came at him with his knife, and was getting the best of it, when Little Cayuse, watching his chance, got up close to the savage who was about to finish his father, and let drive into the brute’s side a charge of shot that made a hole as big as a water-bucket, and the red devil fell without knowing what had hit him.

Both of the men were weak from loss of blood, and when they had recovered a little, not far away in the hollow they found the horses the savages had ridden and that of the express rider, all together.  About a mile farther down the trail they found the dead body of the rider, shot through the head.  His pony still had on the saddle and the mail-pouch, which the Indians had not disturbed.  In the morning the men carried the remains of the unfortunate rider to the cabin and buried it near the station, and it may be truthfully said that if it had not been for the plucky little Pawnee, there would have been no mourners at the funeral.

That afternoon the men dug a trench into which they threw the dead Indians to get them out of the way, but while they were employed in the thankless work, Little Cayuse was discovered most unmercifully kicking and clubbing one of the dead warriors; then he took his little rifle and cooking it emptied its contents into the prostrate body.

The boss then took the weapon away from him, but the boy cried out to him, “See! see!”

Looking down closely into the face of the object of the boy’s wrath, he discovered by that hideous scar the fiend who had captured Little Cayuse when a mere baby, the scar-faced Sioux from whom Whipsaw had purchased the boy.[30]

The employees of the Pony Express were different in character from the ordinary plainsmen of those days.  The latter as a class were usually boisterous, indulged in profanity, and were fond of whiskey.  Russell, Majors, & Waddell were God-fearing, temperate gentlemen themselves, and tried to engage no man who did not come up to their own standard of morality.