"Where are you uns bound?" demanded Knox, breaking out of his covert, and planting himself in the road in front of them.
The Kentuckian was as prudent as he was brave; but if these brigands were permitted to proceed, the business of the Riverlawn Cavalry would be ended in this immediate locality for the present. The enemy before him were two to his one; but he did not appear to take this fact into consideration.
"Who are you?" shouted the foremost of the pair in a ferocious tone, as though he expected to frighten the stalwart inquirer, and with a volley of oaths which startled the Kentuckian, who, maugre his varied experience, was a high-toned man morally, and never used any profane expletives.
"I am in command of this road jest now; and no one, not even Gov'nor McGoffin hisself, could pass out the way you uns is go'n'," replied Life.
"I reckon we uns is gwine out," replied the spokesman of the pair.
"I reckon not," added the sergeant, as he seized the bridle of the fellow's Rosinante, whisked him around, pointing him to the village, and giving him a slap to set him going.
If the brigand had any bad blood in his veins, this decided action was sufficient to make it boil; and he brought up his old flintlock, and began to point it at the "commander of that road just then," and would no doubt have put some of the contents of the rusty barrel through his head or chest, if Life had waited for him to do so. He did not; and he did not even take the trouble to unsling the loaded carbine at his back, but, reaching up, seized the brigand by the throat, and dragged him from his horse, planting him very solidly on the ground.
The ruffian seemed to be as powerless as an infant in his grasp. Knox then snatched the gun from his hands; but the man, clinging to it, came up with it. The sergeant shook him off as he would a fly, and he fell all in a heap on the ground again. Life tossed the weapon over the fence into the bushes. The brigand sprang to his feet, and with a long knife in his hand rushed upon his herculean assailant.