her good to travel with or good to work with; he had
better go up and strike from St. Louis."

"He had better go higher still, Hiram; there's a northern route, and I
hear a lot of the Western men are making across that. However, I will
talk to him."

That afternoon Frank went into Mr. Willcox's little office.

"Hiram has been speaking in very high terms of you, and I find that I am
indebted to you for the saving of the boat, with what cargo she had on
board, which Hiram said he had altogether given up as lost. You seem to
have been in a position of very great danger, and to have had an
extraordinarily narrow escape of your lives. However, I can understand
that you are not content to settle down for life on the Mississippi, but
I can tell you that with enterprise, judgment, and steadiness there is
fortune to be made here still. I am not surprised that the gold-seeking
mania has got hold of you."

"It is not so much, sir, the gold-seeking mania as the excitement
attending it. I don't think I particularly care about making money, but
I do want the excitement of such a life. I have come out for that, and
not, as it is generally called, to make my fortune. The course of my
life at home has been upset by circumstances into which I need not
enter, and, at any rate for a time, I want action, and excitement. After
that, perhaps, I may think of settling down, and what is called making
my way."

"I can understand your feeling, lad, and will not try to persuade you to
stop at this business. And now, what route are you thinking of taking
across the continent?"

"I was thinking of joining a party going direct from here across to
Santa Fe."

"I don't think that will be a good plan, lad. The caravans from here are
composed, for the most part, of very hard characters, the sort of men
who would shoot you for your horse if they took a fancy to it; I would
by no means advise you to ally yourself with such men. I can, I think,
put you in the way of a better plan than that. I find that a great
number of caravans from the West are going by a northern route which
crosses the Missouri at a point called Omaha. I have been thinking that
this will become an important place, and have made up my mind to
freight four or five flats with flour, bacon, and other goods of all
sorts, and a frame store, and to go up there and open a business. I
shall want a handy man with me at first; I shall take up a storekeeper
to leave there in charge, but at