“Pardon me, captain,” broke off Dad, with a sudden wide grin as his eyes chanced to drop from the Confederate’s face to the leveled revolver whose muzzle was now less than a yard from his own chest, “but when you try to hold men up with a pistol, mightn’t it be just a trifle wiser to see that your pistol is cocked?”
The Confederate involuntarily glanced down at his weapon—which, by the way, chanced to be fully cocked—and at the same instant Dad struck.
He struck palm-wide with the speed of a cat. His open hand smote the Confederate across the knuckles; all the force of trained sinews and scientific skill behind the lightning-swift blow.
The pistol was knocked clean out of the captain’s hand and tumbled into the bushes; happily and irretrievably removed from the situation.
Dad’s hand in a flash was at his own holster.
But too late he remembered that he had left his pistol in his tent—having had no idea that he should be riding that day beyond his own army’s lines. He knew, too, that Jimmie was unarmed; for he himself had very vigorously vetoed the boy’s yearning to keep on carrying a huge revolver.
The ruse, to this point had succeeded with ridiculous ease. The Confederate, deceived by his captive’s meek submission, had been wholly unsuspecting.
Wherefore Dad had been able, without trouble, to edge up within striking distance and by use of a time-honored trick to distract and then disarm his would-be captor.
But as he reached in vain for his pistol the situation shifted once more. For the captain, his revolver lost, whipped out the light cavalry saber he carried, and, springing forward, swung the slender blade aloft for a stroke that should avenge his tricking. His colossal and courteous calm had momentarily forsaken him.
There was no time for Dad to snatch his own sword, no chance for thinking. But the blind instinct, wherewith a thousand primeval ancestors have succeeded in enrolling themselves among the “fittest,” came to Dad’s aid.