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167
concluded then that Frank had been stolen from the Kiowas and that white people had stolen him before he learned to talk. Nothing seemed to shake their belief that he was an Indian. They urged him to go to their camp. Frank asked me to go with him and I believe he would have gone had I consented.
While we were at supper the Indians were sitting on piles of bedding which the cook had thrown from the chuck wagon. One of the boys said, "Those damned Indians will put lice on our beds." The cook heard this and, angry at having extra company, said, "I'll get the fireshovel and get them off." The young Indian of course understood, and at a word from him they moved and sat on the grass nearby. Early next morning the Indian who supposed himself to be F'rank's brother, came and for an hour or more tried to persuade him to come and live with them. Frank asked me again to go along, and finally refused, when he saw I couldn't be persuaded. Looking back I can see we might both have been benefited by staying.
We reached Dodge City, Kansas, about six weeks after leaving Wichita Falls. There the boss bought provisions and after crossing the Arkansas River threw the cattle out on the tableland and camped for the night. One incident broke into the regular trail life between this place and Buffalo which it might be well to relate. A Kansas jayhawker had been in the habit of exacting toll from the herds crossing his land at Shawnee Creek. The boss, riding ahead, found out that he asked a cent apiece for the cattle, and decided to put one over on the gentleman. At noon the boss came back to us with instructions to get the cattle across as quickly as possible and not tell the Kansas man how many head we carried. To say about twenty-five hundred if he pressed us. The next morning the boss wrote a check for twenty-five dollars and proceeded at once to Buffalo, where he wired Bob Shadley, the owner, not to honor the check.