"All right! Shake on that."
"You may depend upon me," said the recruit as he grasped Bristow's proffered hand. "Do you remember that big-whiskered, loud-voiced rancheman who gave us the potatoes the other night? He is sadly in need of help, and he told me that if I would come to his house, bringing three or four friends with me, he would give us citizens' clothes and hide us until the officers gave up looking for us. All he asked was, that we should agree to work for him for twelve months, and promise not to leave without giving him due notice."
"I am in for that," exclaimed the recruit who had not spoken before.—"What do you say, Owens?"
"I say I am out of it," was the quick reply. "If I did a thing like that, I never could look a white man in the face again. I have been guilty of a good many mean acts during my life—some that I would gladly recall if I could—but I am not mean enough to desert. Besides, I have no desire to have a bullet sent into me."
Bob's companions did not know whether to be surprised or angry at this plain speech. They stared hard at him for a moment, and then Bristow said,
"Are you really afraid of being shot? Well, I can set your fears on that score at rest. I know that the penalty for desertion in the face of the enemy is death, but we are not in the face of the enemy now. The country is at peace."
"I know it is nominally so," answered Bob, "but it is not so in reality, and never will be so long as these hostile Indians and lawless Mexicans continue to raid over the Texas border. If you skip out, as you threaten to do, you may rest assured that you will be brought back by force of arms, and if you resist you will be shot."
"How does it come that you know so much more than the rest of us?" demanded Bristow angrily. "You are not an old soldier."
"I am aware of that fact, but I have been talking to an old soldier, and that was Haskins. He told me that Major Elliot, one of General Custer's officers, pursued a party of deserters, and when they resisted he shot three of them; and Haskins himself was one of the squad that did the shooting."
"I don't believe a word of it," exclaimed Bristow.