"You'd better come up to the house and get some dry clothes for yourself, my boy," he added to Chad. "You'll catch cold."
"Much obleeged," said Chad. "But I don't ketch cold."
He put on his old coonskin cap, and then the General recognized him.
"Why, aren't you the little boy who bought a horse from me in town the other day?" And then Chad recognized him as the tall man who had cried "Let him have her."
"Yes, sir."
"Well, I know all about you," said the General, kindly. "You are staying with Major Buford. He's a great friend and neighbor of mine. Now you must come up and get some clothes, Harry!"—But Chad, though he hesitated, for he knew now that the gentleman had practically given him the mare, interrupted, sturdily,
"No, sir, I can't go—not while he's a-feelin' hard at me."
"Very well," said the General, gravely. Chad started off on a trot and stopped suddenly, "I wish you'd please tell that little GURL"—Chad pronounced the word with some difficulty—"that I didn't mean nothin' callin' her a little gal. Ever'body calls gurls gals whar I come from."
"All right," laughed the General. Chad trotted all the way home and there Miss Lucy made him take off his wet clothes at once, though the boy had to go to bed while they were drying, for he had no other clothes, and while he lay in bed the Major came up and listened to Chad's story of the afternoon, which Chad told him word for word just as it had all happened.
"You did just right, Chad," said the Major, and he went down the stairs, chuckling: