There was no reply.
“Your hat, sir. Shall I put it on?”
Scarlett took not the slightest notice, and after a momentary hesitation Samson uttered a grunt, pressed his horse a little closer, took the steel cap from the young prisoner’s head, and placed the feathered felt there instead.
Then, backing his horse, he allowed the party to pass on, while he resumed his place, hanging the steel headpiece to his saddle-bow by the strap and chain.
“What’s that? Look!” cried Fred, sharply.
He checked his horse as he spoke, and looked back, needing no answer, for there behind them in the dusty road, battered and disfigured, lay Scarlett’s dashing head-gear; for so badly had it been replaced that, in his suppressed rage, the prisoner had given his head an angry toss, the felt hat had fallen, and it seemed as if, out of malice, every horse had passed over it, and trampled it down in the dust.
“Shall I pick it up, sir?” said Samson.
“No; let it be there,” was the reply. “Take the prisoner the headpiece again.”
Samson muttered to himself as he unhooked the steel cap and rode forward, while, in his resentment at having to go through the same duty twice, he took pains to treat the helmet as if it were an extinguisher, literally putting Scarlett out, so far as seeing was concerned.
And all the while, with his arms bound behind him, Scarlett Markham rode on with his head erect.