WHEN you have been in the USA a month, you get into the everyday swing of things. After leaving Tombstone, we headed for Tucson where we sat out in 104 degree sunshine. With next to no humidity, it just felt hot but we walked about from one place to another and never raised a sweat, or a glow as Ellie would say.

We went to a coffee shop and when I said “no milk”, the server (as we learnt to call the waiters or waitresses) said: “Purist".

She asked me if I wanted Papuan, New Guinea or Bolivian coffee, telling me “the Papuan is especially good this week”, so I said in genu-wine Americ-speak: “I can work with that”. Roughly translated, it means I opted for Papuan.

“Good choice,” she informed me, and I rather suspect it was a flattering remark made to boost my ego and feel generous when reaching for the wallet.

Our friends in North Carolina had told us their daughter had served as a “server” in restaurants during her college years and the wages are so low: only tips make it worthwhile. You can receive a bill with the tip noted at the bottom, listing how much it would be from 15 per cent, up to 25 per cent. Some even list the tip at 30 per cent, I suspect to make 25 per cent seem a bargain.

Ellie ordered a latte and the server nodded knowingly when Ellie added she would have brown sugar. “Exactly,” observed the server, as if Ellie had made the best decision of her life.

We were supposed to feel good about ourselves.

You experience several of these little cameos every day. For instance, in Tombstone we ate at the Longhorn Diner and the waiter there had every table laughing. Clearly he had polished his act for he never failed to cause amusement on every occasion. I forget now what was funny when he served us but I suspect you had to be there, to appreciate the timing of the server who was perhaps 50-years-old.

Another cameo in the same town was when a man with a horse and buggy tried to attract Ellie’s attention. Clearly he was offering a buggy-ride round town but Ellie declined, whereupon he asked her where she came from “with an accent like that”.

She told him she came from England, and he asked her if she knew what they called these four-legged creatures in Arizona. Ellie shook her head.

“Horses,” he replied.

The waiter was funnier than that, I assure you, but it is fair to say there is rarely a dull moment on such trips in the USA.

For instance, when we agreed to take the room for three nights, earlier in the trip, up at Camp Verde, I returned from the car and noticed Ellie’s top was hanging on the wall.

“Washed it already?" I asked. "No," she replied. “I just covered up the steer’s skull and horns. I don’t want that looking at me. It’s bad Feng-shui.”

You get used to the strict rules about no smoking in motel rooms. Being non-smokers we take it as a matter of course. The signs are prominent but one thing you don’t see in Leigh on Sea or Chipping Sodbury is a sign saying “No firearms” in a hotel.

That’s a regular out there in the South-West.

During the lull in conversation as we nursed our respective coffees and nodded appreciatively whenever the server inquired if we liked them; I asked Ellie if she knew of any connection between Lennox Lewis and Tombstone. As she looked suitably baffled, I threw in the name Wyatt Earp as a link.

She was still no wiser so I revealed a nugget of information that has been kicking round the attic of my brain.

Before Lennox won the world heavyweight title, only one British passport holder had ever won that title before. His name was Bob Fitzsimmons who fought in America. One of Bob’s biggest fights was refereed by Wyatt Earp, in San Francisco, where the former lawman climbed in the ring to officiate and had to be disarmed as he was still wearing his famous Colt .45.

There were lots of mentions of Geronimo around that part of Arizona, with cafes, diners, etc named after him. He went on the warpath and then reluctantly returned to San Carlos reservation but he and many Indians rated it a terrible place and he went off again. From 1876 to 1886, he was the last thorn in the Americans’ side.

He eventually agreed to a truce and surrendered. The terms were that he and his followers would be taken to a prisoner of war camp and then allowed to return after two years to San Carlos. Geronimo agreed and was taken to the prisoner of war camp.

As he was the last man to stand out for his way of life, the Yanks had no more reason to keep their Indian trackers, so they sent them to the prisoner of war camp as well, along with the people they had tracked. That was a nice thank you, to people they could not have done without. One can only imagine the reception they received.

Of course, Geronimo and his men never returned to Arizona. The promise and agreement was never honoured. He died in 1909 in Florida.

There was another group of south-west Indians who considered the peace offerings and, when they pointed out they had seen others served short, they were offered safe conduct to Washington to meet with the Big White Father and he would give them his word.

So, off they went open-mouthed, met the President, received assurances and were taken back to the south-west.

Asked if they would now accept the terms, they said they would tell everything to their tribe and discuss it and make up their minds then.

The military said if it was not “yes”, the deal would be off. The Indians said they could not decide without talking to the tribes, so the military sent them all off as prisoners of war to Florida.

A nice example of safe conduct.

We were glad to have seen the wonders of the landscape but on another level, we had always wanted to see where the Indians finally succumbed to the double-dealers - on the plains of South Dakota. We saw these the previous year and then we visited the desert areas the following year.

When we flew out of Tucson, heading for Paris, we looked down on the swathes of unoccupied land and remembered the experiences of Mangas Colorado, Cochise and Geronimo, and it seemed timely to reflect on the words of Chief Joseph up in Montana who said: "The white man made us many promises but he only kept one. He promised to take our land and he took it.”