Carhart smiled. “Better not ask me, Tiffany. I can’t talk to Commodore Durfee until I’ve got all the cards in my hand, and this is the last one. As to going myself, it happens to be the sort of thing I won’t ask anybody to do for me, that’s all.”
“That’s how you like it,” said Tiffany, gruffly, rising. “Want to talk about anything else to-night?”
“No—I shan’t be leaving before to-morrow noon. I’ll see you in the morning.” While he spoke, he was watching Tiffany, and he was amused to see that the veteran had recovered his equilibrium and was angry with himself.
“When will you want to begin your military monkey-shines?”
Carhart drove back a smile, and got up. “Not until I get back here with the wood,” he replied. “Good night.”
Tiffany merely grunted, and marched off to the cot which had been assigned him.
At noon of the following day Carhart was ready to lead his expedition northward. It was made up of all Flint’s wagons, with two men on the seat and two rifles under the seat of each. And scattered along on both sides of the train were men picked from Flint’s bridge-builders and from Old Van’s and Scribner’s iron and tie squads. These men were mounted on fresh ponies, and they carried big holsters on their saddles and stubby, second-hand army carbines behind them. Dimond was there, too, and the long-nosed instrument man. The two or three besides the chief who knew what was soon to be doing kept their own counsel. The others knew nothing, but there was a sort of tingling electricity in the air which had got into every man of the lot. This much they knew; Mr. Carhart was very quiet and considerate and businesslike, but he had a streak of blue in him. And it is the streak of blue in your quiet, considerate leader which makes him a leader indeed in the eyes and hearts of those who are to follow him. Not that there were any heroics in evidence, rather a certain grim quiet, from one end of the wagon train to the other, which meant business. Carhart took it all in, as he cantered out toward the head of the line, dropping a nod here and there, and waving Byers, who was leaning on his pony’s rump and looking impatiently back, to start off. He had picked his men with care—he knew that he could trust them. And so, on reaching the leading wagon and pulling to a walk, he settled himself comfortably in his saddle and began to plan the conversation with Commodore Durfee which was to come next and which was to mean everything or nothing to Paul Carhart.
Once Byers, not observing his abstraction, spoke, “That was hard luck, Mr. Carhart, getting cut off from Sherman this way.”