“Keep together,” Freegift cautioned; and the men pushed after, trying not to limp, and to carry their army muskets easily. Stub brought up the tail of the little procession. He, too, was an American, and proud of it, no matter how they all looked, without hats, in rags and moccasins, the hair of heads and faces long.
They entered the long-fronted building. The doorway was a full four feet thick. The interior was gloomy, lighted by small deep-set windows with dirty panes. There was a series of square, low-ceilinged rooms—“’Tis like a dungeon, eh?” Freegift flung back—but the earth floors were strewn with the pelts of buffalo, bear, panther, what-not.
They were halted in a larger room, with barred windows and no outside door. Lieutenant Bartholomew bowed to Lieutenant Pike, and left. Against the walls there were several low couches, covered with furs and gay blankets, for seats. So they sat down, and the men stared about.
“Whereabouts in here are we, I wonder,” John Brown proposed.
“Did ye see them strings o’ tanned Injun ears hangin’ acrost the front winders!” remarked Hugh Menaugh.
“Sure, we’d never find way out by ourselves,” declared Alex Roy. “It’s a crookeder trail than the one to the Red River.”
The lieutenant briefly smiled; but he sat anxiously.
Lieutenant Bartholomew suddenly returned; close behind him a large, heavy-set, swarthy, hard-faced man, of sharp black eyes, and dressed in a much decorated uniform. Lieutenant Pike hastily arose, at attention; they all rose.
“His Excellency Don Joaquin del Real Alencaster, Governor of the Province of New Mexico,” Lieutenant Bartholomew announced. “I have the honor to present Lieutenant Don Mungo-Meri-Paike, of the American army.”