"Colonel," said I, as we entered his office, "here is the old, gray-headed devil that said to the rebel Colonel, 'Kill the Yankee spy;' and I have brought him in for you to dispose of."
"Bunker," said the Colonel, "a'n't you mistaken?"
"No, I a'n't! I know him, and I found him standing in the very place where he tried to have me shot!" Then turning to the old man, I said: "Didn't you tell the rebel Colonel that I was a Yankee spy, and try to have him shoot me? Tell me the truth, or I'll kill you right here!"
"Ye—yes, I—believe I—d-do—recollect it now."
"You old whelp! you deserve to be shot!" said the Colonel. "Here I have been guarding your house, and guarding your mules, and boarding with you; and you representing yourself to have always been a Union man, and the oath in your pocket that you took last summer!" Then turning to me, he said: "Bunker, I'll dispose of him as he ought to be."
"Thank you, Colonel, I wish you would."
The next morning the guards were removed from the old man's premises, and he was put aboard the cars, in irons, destined to go North.
A day or two afterward I happened to be passing by where a number of rebel prisoners were confined, and there I saw the sutler of the 2d Arkansas Cavalry (the regiment that I run with so long). The sutler knew me, and motioned to me to come in; so I got permission of the officer in charge to go in and see him. He still supposed that I was secesh.
"Ruggles," said he, "I am here under arrest as a guerrilla. Now, you know that I am no guerrilla, but a regularly authorized sutler in the 2d Arkansas Cavalry. I wish you would see the commander of the post and explain that fact to him, so that I may be treated as a prisoner of war, and not as an outlaw."
"Well, I will tell him what I know about it. Perhaps he will recognize you as a prisoner of war."