“Why, the President has something to do with it.”
“Somebody has been stuffing you. Of course they don’t do business that way in Jones county; but these men are in the service, and of course they know what’s right.”
“Well, I am going to wait until I see father, and if he tells me that I am an officer, why I’ll have to believe it.”
This was a new thing to Dan, and he did not say any more. He supposed that the next thing was to be ordered to Mobile, where his uniform, a horse and weapons would be given him, and after that he would be at liberty to take command of a body of scouts the same as this captain had done; but now he began to look at it in a different light.
“I’ll tell you what is the matter with you,” said Cale, after thinking the matter over. “It all comes of your wanting father to get that commission as colonel.”
“Hasn’t he got a right to it, I’d like to know?” retorted Dan. “He said he wouldn’t work for any less.”
“I know, but they didn’t tell him that they would give him that commission. He told us that he was working for it; and here the rebs have gone and got on your blind side—”
“Whoop!” yelled Dan, his anger getting the start of him; and with the word he kicked out savagely at his brother, who was just a little bit too quick for him. He slipped out of the way, and Dan’s momentum took him around on one foot and finally seated him rather roughly on the ground.
“That shows that you don’t believe it more than I do,” said Cale. “Heavens and earth! What’s that?”
It was fortunate that something happened to turn Dan’s mind from all thoughts of revenge, for just then there was a rapid fusillade of carbines heard up the road. Dan picked himself up, and before he could answer there came another report of rifles in reply to the first, and they were so accurately aimed that some of the bullets passed through the branches above their heads. The first alarm was given by the rebels, who wanted to see how many men there were at the bridge. They had halted a little ways from the creek, leaving two men to hold their horses, and crept up on the unconscious sentinel and brought him bleeding to the ground. A moment later they became aware that the pickets at the bridge were too strong to be carried by the small force they had at their command, for the answering volleys that came across the creek—they came thick and fast, too—showed them that the insurgents of Jones county had taken ample precautions. It demonstrated another point to their satisfaction: it showed them that they knew how to fight.