But my departure was
delayed by California Joe, who, notwithstanding the prohibitory laws
of the Territory, in some unaccountable way had got gloriously tipsy,
which caused a loss of time that disgusted me greatly; but as we
could not well do without Joe, I put off starting till the next day,
by which time it was thought he would sober up. But I might just as
well have gone at first, for at the end of the twenty-four hours the
incorrigible old rascal was still dead drunk. How he had managed to
get the grog to keep up his spree was a mystery which we could not
solve, though we had had him closely watched, so I cut the matter
short by packing him into my ambulance and carrying him off to Camp
Sill.
By the time I got back to Sill, the Arapahoes were all in at the
post, or near at hand. The promised surrender of the Cheyennes was
still uncertain of fulfillment, however, and although Little Robe and
his family had remained with us in evidence of good faith, the
messages he sent to his followers brought no assurance of the tribe's
coming in--the runners invariably returning with requests for more
time, and bringing the same old excuse of inability to move because
the ponies were so badly off.
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