“Arden, don’t move or you’re a dead man!”
“I know it,” was the quiet reply from the Texan, who did not stir a muscle, “but what can I do? I’m a dead man anyway.”
CHAPTER V.
A TEST OF ONE’S NERVES.
NICK RIBSAM and Herbert Watrous could hardly believe their own senses, and for a second or two looked at each other and at the cowboys, to make sure they had heard aright.
The youths were lolling near each other, Nick leaning on his elbow and looking in the broad face of Lattin, who just then was telling of a scrimmage in which he had had the closest call of his life while hunting Geronimo, while Herbert sat more erect.
Strubell, as has been told, was lying on his back on the other side of the camp fire, his hands clasped behind his head, and resting on his stone pillow. His sombrero lay on his forehead, in such a way that a part of the rim shaded his eyes, whose view of the outer world was obtained by gazing down along the front of his face and chin. He could see his slowly heaving breast, the cartridge belt, and the one leg crossed over the other and partly crooked at the knee. Off to the left was the glowing camp fire, and, by turning his eyes without moving his head, he could trace a part of the figure of Lattin, who was discoursing for the entertainment of his young friends.
This was the shape of matters, when the younger cowboy abruptly checked his narrative, and, looking across the fire at his companion, warned him not to move on the penalty of instant death, to which the other, without stirring a muscle or giving any evidence of alarm, calmly replied that he was aware of his situation, which was so hopeless that he considered himself the same as dead already.