't get
away." They were also going to see that Esau was brought into town.

What happened after they got out there I only know from hearsay, for I
was not a member of the Salvation army at that time. But I learned from
one of those present, that they found Esau down in the sage brush on the
bottoms that lie between the abrupt corner of Sheep mountain and the
Little Laramie river. They captured him but he died soon after, as it
was told me, from the effects of opium taken with suicidal intent. I
remember seeing Esau the next morning, and I thought I noticed signs of
ropium, as there was a purple streak around the neck of the deceased,
together with other external phenomena not peculiar to opium.

But the grand difficulty with the Salvation army was that it didn't want
to bring Esau into town. A long, cold night ride with a person in Esau's
condition was disagreeable. Twenty miles of lonely road with a
deceased murderer in the bottom of the wagon is depressing. Those of
my readers who have tried it will agree with me that it is not
calculated to promote hilarity.

[Illustration: _Mr. Whatley hadn't gone more than half a mile when he
heard the wild and disappointed yells of the Salvation army_
(Page 159)]

So the Salvation army stopped at Whatley's ranch to get warm, hoping
that some one would steal the remains and elope with them. They stayed
some time and managed to "give away" the fact that there was a reward of
$5,000 out for Esau, dead or alive. The Salvation army even went so far
as to betray a good deal of hilarity over the easy way it had nailed the
reward or would as soon as said remains were delivered up and
identified.

Mr. Whatley thought that the Salvation army was having a kind of walk
away, so he slipped out at the back door of the ranch, put Esau into his
own wagon and drove off to town. Remember, this is the way it was told
to me.

Mr. Whatley hadn't gone more than half a mile when he heard the wild and
disappointed yells of the Salvation army. He put the buckskin on the
back of his horse without mercy, urged on by the enraged shouts and
yells of his infuriated pursuers. He reached town about midnight, and
his pursuers disappeared. But what was he to do with Esau?

He drove around all over town trying to find the official who signed for
the deceased. He went from house to house like a vegetable vender,
seeking sadly for the party who would give him a $5,000 check for Esau.
Nothing could be more de