He took an especial interest in their shooting, and would often set up a target on the prairie for them to practice on.
"You'll do first-rate in a little while," he said. "And as Lambert says you take to drilling, it won't be long afore you're both out-and-out soldiers."
"I don't know as I care to be a regular soldier," answered Darry. "I wouldn't mind it for a while, but to enlist for five years—why, that's another thing."
"Lambert has enlisted four times. When his time is out he'll be in service twenty years."
"And yet he is only a private," put in Joe.
"He is content, and doesn't want to go any higher. He likes the life, and he told me not long ago that he wouldn't know what to do with himself if he was out of Uncle Sam's employ."
One day after another passed, until the boys had been at the fort a little over a week. They now knew the drills and the "time-card" as well as anybody, and often practiced on the apparatus in the gymnasium.
"It's not so bad, after you once get used to it," said Joe. "The men are a good deal of company for each other."
"It's odd to see so many men and so few women," returned Darry.
"Some of the men don't want any women around, so I've been told. They are like some of the old-time miners who used to move out of camp as soon as a dress-skirt showed itself."