Yours faithfully, Jack.
"WE WERE NOW OUT OF THE SMOKE"
[THE COLONEL OF THE FIRST CYCLE INFANTRY]
“You certainly are a tough outfit, colonel—you and your night-hawks of the First Bikes—and I am not sure you could not have us cavalrymen going to bed with our boots on, if we were on the other side,” said Major Ladigo, as he bit at the end of a fresh cigar.
“Yes—bless me—Pedal’s outfit might come into camp on top of yours, Ladigo, and where would my guns be then? I can’t have my gunners sitting on their trails all day and all night too,” sighed the big gunner, from the other end of the tent.
“It was good work,” continued the old brigadier—“here, boy, pass those glasses—and I have always thought well of the possibilities of that machine in a certain sort of military operations. I don’t think you can chase Apaches with it—in fact, the only way to chase Apaches is to agree to pay about $500 a head for them; and, also, I don’t think, Colonel Pedal—with all due respect for your enthusiasm—that you could ever become of all-absorbing interest in great operations between organized armies, but I do not want to commit myself since you seem to accomplish such feats in these days. If we had not had a really progressive man at the head of the army you would not have had this opportunity; but now, Pedal, all these fellows want to hear about your outfit, and especially how you conducted that affair at North Colville—they all want to know—go ahead now—we have plenty of time to listen,” and Colonel Pedal of the First Bikes twirled his forage cap in his two hands and grinned pleasantly.
“Well—it was simple enough,” he said.