“Keep that little fool horse still!” she said.
Now the patrol, which had stopped to hail, was coming on again. Banjo’s horse was not to be sequestered, nor his craving for companionship in that lonesome night suppressed. He lifted his shrill nicker again, and a shot from the outriders of cavalry was the answer.
“Answer them, tell them who you are Banjo—they all know you—and I’ll slip away. Good-bye, and thank you for your brave help!”
“I’ll go with you, they’ll hear one as much as they’ll hear two.”
“No, no, you can help me much better by doing as I tell you. Tell them that a led horse got away from you, and that’s the noise of it running away.”
She waited for no more words, for the patrol was very near, and now and then one of them fired as he rode. Banjo yelled to them.
“Say, you fellers! Stop that fool shootin’ around here, I tell you!”
“Who are you?” came the answer.
“Banjo, you darned fool! And I tell you right now, pardner, the first man that busts my fiddle with a bullet’ll have to mix with me!”