"I'll go, but I'll not promise to stay there," said Rodney.
"Where will you go?"
"Up to Missouri. I have set my heart on being a partisan, and if my own State won't take me, I have a perfect right to offer my valuable services to another. I shall start for Baton Rouge to-morrow, and I and my horse will take passage on the first St. Louis boat that comes along."
"Hear, hear!" shouted some of the. Rangers.
"Let's go in a body," said one. "We have the assurance that our services will be accepted, that the officers we have elected will be retained, that our plan of organization will not be interfered with, and what more could we ask for?"
"That won't suit me," another declared. "I don't want to leave my
State."
"How are you going to help yourself?" demanded Rodney. "If you join the
Confederate army you are liable to be ordered up to Virginia or down to
Florida. And you know as well as I do what the people around here will
think of you if you make up your mind to stay at home."
"Let's take the sense of the company on it," suggested Lieutenant
Percy.
"All right," answered the captain. "Put the thing in the form of a motion and I will."
This was quickly done, and to Rodney's great disappointment, though not much to his surprise, the proposition was defeated by a large majority. The Rangers were opposed to deserting their State in a body and going into another.