An officer walked rapidly along behind their own line, his voice, high-keyed with excitement, striving vainly to be reassuring.
"Now, boys, now, don't get scared," he kept repeating. "Hang it all, hold your fire, men! Hold your fire!"
All at once the volume of yells ceased. Al and Wallace looked to the front and saw that the whole line of the enemy had stopped, rigid as a fence. Even as they looked, a volley blazed along the line as if fired from one gun. The fat man beside Al dropped his musket and began to cry, frantically,
"Oh, oh, oh, my shoulder! Oh, oh, oh, my shoulder!"
There was no time to heed him. Through the wall of smoke before them, created by the volley, again broke the Confederates on the run, their dreadful yell preceding them, the two frayed battle flags eddying above the smoke like the masts of catboats in a seaway.
"Lord, Al, they don't fight like Indians!" gasped Wallace, hoarsely.
As a photograph on the brain there came to Al a flashing recollection of the broad plain fronting Tahkahokuty, bathed in the sunlight, with the Sioux swooping and circling before the steadily advancing troops.
"No," said he, briefly.
The officer came behind them again, running, and bellowing above the uproar,
"Company, rise! Fire by company! Ready! Aim! Fire!"