"Yes," he replied, "it was. It was fear of a coward's name, and a sort of abject horror of being one."
"Too big a coward inside," I laughed, "to be a big stout coward outside," and he assented.
"Smith," he said, and paused long, "if I were a hard drinker and should try to quit, it wouldn't be courage that would carry me through, but fear; quaking fear of a drunkard's life and a drunkard's death."
I was about to rejoin that the danger was already at his door, but he read the warning accusation in my eye.
"I'm afraid so," he responded. "I had a strange experience once," he presently added, as if reminded of it by what we had last said. "I took a prisoner."
"By the overwhelming power of fear?" I inquired.
"Partly, yes. I saw him before he saw me and I felt that if I didn't take him he'd either take me or shoot me, so I covered him and he surrendered. We were in an old pine clearing grown up with oak bushes."
"Would it have been less strange," I inquired, "if you had been in an old oak clearing grown up with pine bushes?"
"No, he'd have got away just the same."
"What! you didn't bring him in?"