“Which is just what we are now,” rejoined Pryor. “The sooner we start back the quicker we’ll be out of this.”
“Pryor!” The square face of the Irishman hardened at once. “Listen to me. Ye’re my bunkmate and friend, but I warn ye not to say that agin! If ye said it where he could hear ye—that man ahead—do you know what he would do to you?”
“I ain’t particular. ’Tis time we took this thing into our own hands.”
“It’s where we’re takin’ it now, Pryor!” said Gass ominously. “A coort martial has set for less than that ye’ve said!”
“Mebbe you couldn’t call one—I don’t know.”
“Mebbe we couldn’t, eh? I mind me of a little settlement I had with that man wance—no coort martial at all—me not enlisted at the toime, and not responsible under the arthicles of war. I said to his face I was of the belief I could lick him. I said it kindly, and meant no harm, because at the time it seemed to me I could, and ’twould be a pleasure to me. But boys, he hit me wan time, and when I came to I was careless whether it was the arthicles of war or not had hit me. Listen to me now, Pryor—and you, too, Ordway—a man like that is liable to have judgment in his head as well as a punch in his arm. We’re safer to folly him than to folly ourselves. Moreover, I want you to say to your men that we will not have thim foregatherin’ around and talkin’ any disrespect to their shuperiors. If we’re in a bad place, let us fight our ways out. Let’s not turn back until we are forced. I never did loike any rooster in the ring that would either squawk or run away. That man yonder, on ahead, naded mighty little persuadin’ to fight. I’m with him!”
“Well, maybe you are right, Pat,” said Ordway after a time. And so the mutiny once more halted.
The tide changed quickly when it began to set the other way. Lewis led an advance party across the range. One day, deep in the mountains, he was sweeping the country with his spyglass, as was his custom. He gave a sudden exclamation.
“What is it, Captain?” asked Hugh McNeal. “Some game?”