Slowly Drew shook his head. "The General has been reported defeated before, suh. No, he's right here outside Bardstown. And I wouldn't rightly say he was broken either, not with a couple of regiments behind him—"
"Couple of regiments!" The man was buttoning his coat, his red jowls sagging a little, almost as if Drew had used the carbine across his unprotected head. "Couple of regiments ... Morgan ..." he repeated dazedly. "Well," sullenly he spoke to Drew, "what does he want?"
"You're a captain," Drew spoke crisply. "You'll return with us to discuss surrender terms with an officer of equal rank!"
"Surrender!" For a moment some of the sag went out of the other.
"Two regiments—an' you have maybe eighty or ninety men." Kirby gazed with critical disparagement at such Union forces as were visible.
"One hundred and twenty-five," the officer repeated mechanically and then glared at the Texan.
"One hundred and twenty-five then." Kirby was willing to be generous. "All ready to hold this heah town. I don't see no artillery neither." He rose in his stirrups to view the immediate scene. "Goin' to fight from house to house maybe—?"
"General Morgan," Drew remarked to the company at large, "is not a patient man. But it's your decision, suh. If you want to make a fight of it." He shrugged.
"No! Well, I'll talk ... listen to your terms anyway. Get my horse!" he roared at the nearest soldier.
They escorted the captain with due solemnity out of Bardstown to meet Campbell, a well-armed guard in evidence strung out on the pike. The Union officer picked up enough assurance to demand to see the General himself, but Campbell's show of surprised hauteur at the request was an expert's weapon in rebuttal; and the other not only subsided but agreed without undue protest to Campbell's statement of terms.