Well, they put him on a mule, handcuffed, with a chain to his ankles passed around the belly of the mule. He was, of course, unarmed, and I drove him on ahead of me to break trail. He was a powerfully built fellow, neither tall nor short, and close-knit. He had a face that was not so bad, showing the French and Indian strains in him plainly. When we had been riding along silently for several hours, I called to him to stop and rode up beside him.
I looked into his eyes, and that look satisfied me that I was safe in doing what I had thought of. His eyes were large and black and quiet.
“I am going to take the cussed irons off your legs and arms,” I said; “you can’t keep warm this way.” He watched me taking them off and said nothing. I threw the irons away. “Go on,” I said. And he went, giving me a look that thanked me more than words could have done.
He had the eyes of a brave man. I was never much afraid of a brave man; it’s the cowards you have to watch, you know.
All day we rode, saying nothing. In the evening we made a shelter with our blankets in the bend of a creek where the plum bushes were thick. The man was a good hand at the business, and seemed anxious to please me.
We cooked and ate supper, then rolled up in our blankets. I put my two six-shooters under my head for fear that I might have somehow misread the man’s eyes.
When I awoke in the morning, he had breakfast cooked and the nags saddled. When we were eating I said: “Why didn’t you take my horse and run away? I could never have caught you with the mule.”
He searched me for a moment with his eyes.
“Because I’m not a coward,” he said.
And all day we rode again in silence, until, toward evening, he set up a wild sort of a song—a chanson of his fathers, I suppose—in a voice that was strong but sweet.