“No man knows the danger better than you do. I need not warn you.”
“Quite needless, sir. I know the game from A to Z.”
“Very true. But there are great odds against you.”
“No man, I believe, sir, stands a better chance of getting through than myself.”
“That is so; yet, while many good men might be spared to make the attempt, you are the one who cannot be replaced.”
“Thank you, sir; but my life is no more to me than another man’s is to him. If I’d been thinking of the chances of getting shot up all these years, I reckon I’d turned up my toes long ago. I never think of death if I can help it.”
“It’s true, Cody!” exclaimed the major. “You act as though the bullet wasn’t molded that could kill you.”
“So the redskins say, I believe,” responded the scout grimly.
“Yet your place cannot easily be filled,” the major said again. “If you can get some other volunteer I wish you would. I don’t want to lose you, Bill.”
“Captain Keyes is anxious to go, sir, but——”