That night the mother and the oldest boy sat by the campfire and
watched the long night away with their dead.

The stars marched in solemn procession across the sky.

The slow, crawling night passed.

The first faint flush of dawn appeared in the East.

I lay near the campfire, my head pillowed on a saddle, and heard the
widowed mother and her boy talking in low but earnest tones.

“We must go back—we must go back to Illinois. It is the only thing to
do,” I heard the mother moan.

And the boy answered: “Mother, listen to what I say: We will go on—we
will go on. We know where father was going to take us—we know what he
was going to do. We will go on, and we will do what he intended to do,
and if possible we will do it better. We will go on!”

That first burst of pink in the East had turned to gold.

Great streaks of light stretched from horizon to zenith.

I could see in the dim and hazy light the hobbled horses grazing
across the plain a quarter of a mile away.

The boy of fifteen arose and put fuel on the fire.

After breakfast I saw that boy get a spade, a shovel and a pick out of