CHAPTER V.
CAPTURING A WAGON-TRAIN.
“Now,” said Mr. Sprague, when Leon rode up beside him, “you want to go and tell your mother the reason that I don’t come home to-night. I shall have to stay here with the men, to be ready to start out with them at an early hour.”
“Then after that I suppose I can stay at home,” said Leon.
“Yes; I think that would be the best place for you. Those twenty-five men, and all of them old soldiers, are not going to give up that wagon-train without some resistance.”
“Well, now, I’ll tell you what’s a fact, father,” said Leon, decidedly. “I just ain’t a-going to stay at home.”
“Why not?” said Mr. Sprague, in surprise.
“If you are going to meet those men, I am going, too. You needn’t think you are going into danger without my being close beside you. I wouldn’t dare look mother in the face again if I should be guilty of remaining at home.”
Mr. Sprague looked down at the horn of his saddle and thought about it. Leon had really more pluck than his father thought he had, and after awhile he thought it would be better to let the boy have his own way in the matter.
“I don’t see what is the use of sending any word at all home to mother,” said Leon, after pondering what his father had said. “She knows that we are in the service of the county, and she won’t care whether we come home or not. The best way would be to stay right down here and go home when we get the job done.”
This settled the matter, and Mr. Sprague never referred to it again. About eight o’clock they arrived at the little bridge which spanned the creek that flowed between Jones and Perry counties, and there Mr. Sprague halted his men and motioned to Mr. Swayne to go on. The man complied, and when he had got far enough across to let all the wagons that came after him get a footing on Confederate soil he stopped and jumped out.