19/02/2026 14:13

---

An hour or two before dawn the rain stopped, and soon a bright sun shone above the wet prairie. Elmira looked away. Everywhere he looked he began to see things that could have been Indians. But that was a normal hazard, the horses being unreliable and the prickly pear abundant.

You best watch close, he said. I never said you couldn't. He was modest in some matters and had just returned from walking a mile, in order to relieve his bowels in private. Pea Eye sat in the back end, resting.