While the men unhitched and unsaddled, the squaws--for the most part
large shapeless creatures totally unlike the slim Indian maid of
fiction, and indescribably dirty--started small fires with twigs they
had brought with them. By now Ma Wagor, the gray-haired woman from Blue
Springs, was in the store every day, helping out, and she was as
terrified as Ida and I. It seems there were no Indians in Blue Springs.
They were among the few contingencies for which Ma Wagor was not amply
prepared.

By chance a strange cowboy came through about sundown and stopped for a
package of tobacco. While he dexterously rolled a cigarette with one
hand we surrounded him, three panic-stricken women. Did he think the
Indians were on the war path, we asked, our teeth chattering.

"Oh, I don't know," he answered carelessly, "can't tell a speck about an
Indian. Couldn't blame 'em, could you, with these landgrabbers invadin'
their range?"

The logic of this had already occurred to us, and we were not
particularly cheered by the cowboy's confirmation of our worst
suspicions.

"What do you suppose they're buildin' them fires for?" Ma Wagor was
anxious to know.

Sourdough couldn't say as to that. But he 'lowed it might be to burn the
scalps in.

At that we missed Ma. She had slipped into the house to wash her feet.
Ma was a great believer in preparedness, whether having something cooked
ahead for supper, or clean feet for heaven.

Instinctively I put my hand on my shock of fair hair to make sure it was
still in place. It had always been a nuisance, but now I felt a
passionate eagerness to keep it where it was.

The Indians stretched their tepees and cooked their supper. The prairie
around them was alive with bony horses and hungry-looking dogs. It was
the impatient yelping of the dogs about the kettles rather than any
sounds from the soft-footed Indians which we heard.

The cowboy threw his cigarette on the floor, stamped on it with a jingle
of spurs, and drawled, "Guess I'll be percolatin'--got to ride
night-herd."

Ma Wagor grabbed him by his wide belt. "You're goin' to do your
night-herdin' right in front of this shack," she declared grimly.
"You've got your pistol and we women need protection." Looking at Ma's
set jaw he promised to hang around that night.

Locked in the shack, we waited for the cowboy's signal of attack. He'd
"shoot 'em down as fast as they crossed the trail," he assured us, but
we were not so confident of his