“We’ll fight while there’s a bullet left or a breath in us,” responded Archie, promptly.
“All right, fellows, if you say so,” said Joe, strapping on his cartridge belt; “but it seems to me you’re making a mistake.”
“How so?” I asked, rather indignantly.
“Look at them,” said Joe. The Arabs had halted just out of range, but we could count their numbers now. “There are about twenty of the rascals, and they’re all armed. We can’t hope to beat them in a fight. We can kill a few, of course, but they’ll down us in the end. And what then? Why, they’ll be mad as hornets, and want revenge. It’s natural. But as it now stands we are not the enemies of these heathens, as I can see, having had no dealings with them. I understand they want to rob us, for they think we’ve got the money those merchants paid Archie—that beast Abdul Hashim is at the head of them. But if we submit quietly to being searched they won’t find any money and they’ll scarcely dare kill us for disappointing them.”
“I don’t know about that,” said Archie, eyeing the foe fiercely. “I’ve heard Van Dorn say these Arabs will kill a Christian as calmly as they’ll eat a dinner. They think a good Mahommedan will gain paradise by killing an infidel dog. And besides that, if they try to rob us and then let us go our ways, they’ll be afraid we will make trouble for them with the police. No, Joe; it’s robbery they mean first, and murder afterward; you can rely upon that.”
“Maybe so, sir,” answered Joe. “But I was just looking for our one chance. To fight means sure death; to give in quietly means a hope for life—not a great hope, sir, but one just big enough to hang your hat on. If you say fight, I’m with you. If you say be foxy and try diplomacy, I’ll like it better.”
“Humph!” said I, partly convinced. “Perhaps Joe’s right.”
“I’m sure he is,” responded Archie, frankly. “But I hate to see those beggars down us so easily.”
“Discretion is the better part of valor,” I quoted, pompously; yet I longed to fight, too.
“We aren’t giving in, fellows,” declared Joe; “we’re just playing our best cards in the game, and it isn’t our fault if we don’t hold all trumps. Come on; don’t let’s act like cowards, or even whipped curs. Let’s go to meet them—and, say, put up your rifles. We won’t show any force, but try to smile and look pleasant.”