"Good. How many?"
"Free."
"Have they swords?"
"Yes, sah."
"Where are they?"
"On de stool, too."
"That will do; keep with the horses, and don't be frightened if you hear anything. We'll give you freedom yet, if you'll be prudent."
He could hear the men grumbling because the food was not enough to go around. The liquor had begun to work in their systems, drinking so lavishly, and without nourishment to absorb its fiery quality. Jack let enough time pass to give this ally full play in disabling the troopers, then taking Barney to the rear of the cabin, whispered:
"I will dash in at the door, seize the weapons, and demand surrender. You make a great ado here; give command, as if there were a squad. The boys will make a loud clatter with the horses, and we shall bag the game without a blow. Now, be prudent. Barney, and we will go into the Union lines in triumph."
Inside the men were laughing uproariously, mingling accounts of love and war in a confused medley—how a sweetheart in Petersburg was only waiting for the stars on her lover's collar to make him happy; how the Yankees would be wiped out of the Peninsula as soon as Jack Magruder got his nails pared for fight; how three Yankees had been gobbled that day, and how others were in the net to be taken in the morning. The bacchanal was at its highest when Jack, dashing into the open doorway, placed himself between the drinkers and their arms, and cried, sternly, as he pointed his pistol at the group: