Part 12 (1/2)
We were tempted to stop and camp with them, but as it was early we concluded not to lose half a day, and so went on. A shower that blew up shortly after we left came near soaking us before we could get the sheet down. It rained so much that it made the roads muddy, and by night we had made only eighteen miles.
We had reached the National Soldiers' Cemetery, and on inquiring if there was any objection to our camping there, were made to feel at home by Mr. Ingle, the superintendent. He showed us a good place to camp, offered to let us cook on his stove if we wanted to, and suggested we put our horses in his pasture. We did not need to use his stove as we had dry wood, but had to hurry to get our supper and make things tight for the night, as it soon began to rain again and kept it up all night. I guess we were tired, because I remember we turned in early, and when I woke the next morning I found the lantern still burning. I had gone to sleep so quickly that I forgot to blow it out, and slept soundly all night with it lighted and hanging right over my head.
The next day, August thirteenth, was fine and clear, and we decided not to start on until the roads had dried up some, and so visited with Mr. Ingle for a few hours. He showed us the cemetery where all the old soldiers who were killed in the Indian fights were buried, and told us about this country when he first came through here as a young man in the army. Then they were having more or less trouble with the Indians.
Now the Indians are all gone and he is an old man, looking after the graves of those who died or were killed at that time. There is just one Indian buried here, Spotted Horse, a staunch friend of the whites.
Norman was quite interested in the process of moving the bodies of some of the soldiers that had been placed in the wrong locations, and busied himself helping the men move them while Mr. Ingle talked to me about the days when this country still belonged to the Indians.
He had a desk in his office, made of cedar. It had been made by hand many years ago out of cedar cut from the hill back of the cemetery.
Sawed out by hand and fastened with wooden pins, it was nevertheless a fine piece of furniture. His office was full of Government records of soldiers and correspondence, and would be a good place for any one to pick up old army tales, which could be written up under the trees beside the graves, with no one to disturb.
This cemetery, miles away from any town, surrounded by a brick wall and filled with trees shading every corner, seemed a very appropriate place for those old Indian fighters to rest, and we were glad we had had the opportunity of seeing it, and talking with the superintendent, who knew so much about the men who were buried there.
Mr. Ingle wanted us to spend Sunday with him and, if time had permitted, we should have liked to do so, but with our usual haste we left at twelve o'clock, after selling our old saddle to one of his men for seven dollars. We got our pay by cas.h.i.+ng a check from Mr. Ingle, less seven dollars, and as it was a Government pension check we took no risk. As he wanted a dollar more I cashed his personal check on the First National Bank of North Platte. I just mention this to ill.u.s.trate how checks are used as currency in this country and no questions asked. Later I stopped at a country store and offered ten dollars in payment for some small article and was told they could not change it unless I would take small checks. They had cashed so many they were out of currency. We managed to sc.r.a.pe up the change and went on.
Later, pa.s.sing through a small town, I went into the railroad station to send a telegram, for which the charges were sixty cents, and handed the ticket agent the ten dollars. He said he would have to go over town and get it changed if I did not have anything smaller. Just then I thought of the check for one dollar that Mr. Ingle had given me, and so I said, ”I have a check for one dollar, if that will go.” He snapped me up with ”Why didn't you say so before?” and handed out forty cents, waiting until I had produced the check and endorsed it, when he put it in the cash drawer, hardly looking at it. I left, wondering how easy it might be to put bogus checks through, if even the railroad company took them that easy. Well, we didn't have to try to pa.s.s any bogus checks, but it did seem that the people were a bit careless.
Leaving the cemetery we drove to Brady Island, where we crossed to the north side of the river on a bridge that seemed a mile long, but in only one small channel was there any water running. We drove on a few miles over sandy roads and then camped, about eleven miles from Gothenburg. The next morning, we drove through Gothenburg, not expecting to go far, but looking for a good camping place, which we didn't find. It was a sandy, muddy road to Gothenburg, and then we drove six miles to Willow Island and five more to Cozad, and found no good camp site. Then we thought we might come to a creek about two miles farther on, but after driving three miles and not finding one, we camped alongside of the road, making about twenty-five or twenty-six miles for the day.
We met several prairie schooners to-day. One party of young men, going to Sutherland, stopped us to ask about the roads west and where to cross the river. Just before starting up one of them asked me where we were from, and when I told him California, he seemed speechless for a minute, but finally came to and, as we started up, asked me this question, which I didn't get a chance to answer--and perhaps he did not expect me to--_viz._, ”Say, stranger, where are you going to, or don't you know?”
Some way that question seemed to strike me as especially funny, and the more I thought about it the funnier it seemed, until I found myself laughing heartily. Norman didn't hear his question, and when I told him what I was laughing at, he said, ”I suppose that fellow thought we had started out and didn't know enough to stop,” which remark set me to laughing again and, when I could answer, I said, ”Well, I think he was perfectly justified in asking the question.
After this if any one asks us where we are from we will tell them from North Platte, and if they ask us where we are going we can tell them Kearney. This will be enough for them to know and will save conversation and may keep us out of the lunatic asylum.”
We had shot a young rabbit, which we had for breakfast, and Norman kept the foot for luck. The next day was foggy and, as we drove along slowly, Norman shot two jack rabbits with the rifle, making a double, so to speak. He saw only one of the jacks, and as he shot it the other jumped into sight and ran away, but didn't get far when Norman's second shot knocked him over. This we considered an omen of good luck, as well as marksmans.h.i.+p.
Later we pulled an automobile out of a mud hole with Sally, after having some fun with the men who were trying to start it. I charged them two dollars for doing it, which amused Norman greatly. We divided the money, two silver dollars, and drove on.
Next, Norman spied a quail sitting on a nest close to the road, on a perfectly bare patch of ground. How a quail had the nerve to make a nest in such an exposed place was more than we could tell. Mr.
Roosevelt would probably say that we didn't see it in any such place.
To be sure, however, we stopped, walked over to her, and she ran away, which proved that she was alive; and we counted sixteen eggs, which proved that she was setting on them. There wasn't anything as big as a match to hide it, and the public road was not more than ten feet away.
Without molesting the nest we drove on about half a mile to Buffalo Creek and made our noon camp. Here there was plenty of gra.s.s, and we stayed until 4 P. M., and then drove on six miles to Lexington, where we stayed all night. Our horses are doing fairly well, except Sally.
She is lazy and needs to be prodded most of the time.
Leaving Lexington at seven-thirty the next morning we had fair roads, with the exception of a mud hole now and then, until we reached Overton. The country is spa.r.s.ely settled, flat, and uninteresting. At Overton we were stopped by a fellow who said he wanted to buy a horse, and I offered to sell him Sally, and after d.i.c.kering on the price for a while he said he would give me a saddle horse for her. He brought out the saddle horse which looked like a good one, but I didn't want to trade horses; I wanted to sell one. Having spent an hour doing a lot of talking to the edification of most of the population in the little town, we drove on without selling Sally. Norman thought we should have traded, just to be doing something, as the going was monotonous and a new horse would give us something new to play with; but I concluded we were better off without a horse we would have to watch, tie up at night, and possibly find harder work disposing of than Sally.
During the afternoon we drove through Simmons and Elm Creek, over some dirt roads that were fine. It looked like rain, but a strong wind came up and we concluded it would blow the rain away, so we were in no hurry to get our supper over. We had camped about eleven miles from Kearney, turned our horses loose, and were just was.h.i.+ng up the dishes after supper by lantern light, when a hard thunder shower came up, and by the time we had got things under cover it was raining hard. Before turning in for the night I concluded, as there was a field of alfalfa near by that was not fenced, that I had best get the horses up for fear they might stray into it during the night and get foundered. So putting on my rubber coat and boots, I went out and hunted them up and, with the aid of the lightning flashes, brought them up and tied them to the wagon, and then we turned in and listened to the rain on our canvas cover for about a minute, and the next minute (so it seemed) it was morning, and the rain was over.
As we turned out that morning the country looked as if it had been literally soaked; water stood in the fields, and the dirt roads that were so fine the night before were seas of mud. It was still cloudy, but we concluded, if we delayed starting, the sun would soon come out and dry things up a bit and make it easier going. By eleven o'clock it was still cloudy and we decided not to wait any longer, so hitched up and drove very slowly through the mud the eleven miles to Kearney, where we arrived at about 3 P. M., having stopped near the midway sign for lunch. This sign, supposed to be half-way across the continent, says:
”1,733 miles to Frisco, Boston 1,733.”
We wanted to change the sign so it would read
”1,600 miles to Los Angeles, and 800 miles to Chicago”