When Guy had left the room, the Colonel's face relaxed, and filling up his pipe he settled himself for a smoke.
"I do not think he will go," said the Adjutant with a laugh. "I know I would not stir a peg after I had received such a permission as that."
"Keep an eye on him," said the Colonel, "and if you see him mount his horse, just step up and tell him not to go out of sight of the Fort. I do not blame these boys for getting impatient, I want to do something myself, but I don't know what it is."
"Halloo, Preston, where are you going now?" exclaimed one of his roommates, as he entered his apartment and began to overhaul his hunting rig. "A shotgun! You are not going outside!"
"The Colonel told me to go," answered Preston. "He called them sage hens, but I believe they are prairie chickens."
"And you are going outside to shoot them, and the Sioux all around you?" cried the young officer, throwing down his book and raising himself to a sitting posture on his bunk. "Guy, you are crazy."
"I guess that is what the Colonel seemed to think; but he told me to go, and said he never expected to meet me again. He is going to bluff me, but he will find that I am not that sort."
Guy then went on to tell Perkins how the request was received and the way it was granted, to all of which he listened in amazement. As soon as he began to get it through his head, he implored his roommate to let the permission go by default; the Colonel did not expect him to go; he knew how perilous the undertaking was, and he hoped, by drawing it in its true colors, to make Preston see it also; but Preston did not see it in that way.
"He did not go at it right," said he. "He took the very course to make me go out there. If he is going to find out how brave I am, he will certainly find it out."
"You are a fool," declared Perkins hotly. "I never expect to see you again either. When I shake you by the hand at the gate it will be the last time until I see you brought in for good."