"Now, my dear friend," said Saint Vrain, "you feel a hundred per cent,
better! But, tell me, were you in earnest when you spoke of going with
us across the plains? We start in a week; I shall be sorry to part with
you so soon."
"But I was in earnest. I am going with you, if you will only show me
how I am to set about it."
"Nothing easier: buy yourself a horse."
"I have got one."
"Then a few coarse articles of dress, a rifle, a pair of pistols, a--"
"Stop, stop! I have all these things. That is not what I would be at,
but this: You, gentlemen, carry goods to Santa Fe. You double or treble
your money on them. Now, I have ten thousand dollars in a bank here.
What should hinder me to combine profit with pleasure, and invest it as
you do?"
"Nothing; nothing! A good idea," answered several.
"Well, then, if any of you will have the goodness to go with me, and
show me what sort of merchandise I am to lay in for the Santa Fe market,
I will pay his wine bill at dinner, and that's no small commission, I
think."
The prairie men laughed loudly, declaring they would all go a-shopping
with me; and, after breakfast, we started in a body, arm-in-arm.
Before dinner I had invested nearly all my disposable funds in printed
calicoes, long knives, and looking-glasses, leaving just money enough to
purchase mule-waggons and hire teamsters at Independence, our point of
departure for the plains.
A few days after, with my new companions, I was steaming up the
Missouri, on our way to the trackless prairies of the "Far West."