"Hell, yes! Just so we're movin'!"
"O.K. Put it to a vote of the men outside. Do we stay, and maybe get croaked, or do we fall back and conserve our strength until we need it? Take care of it, eh, Davey?"
Crockett picked up his guitar and went outside.
Travis roared, "This is insubordination! Treason!" He drew his saber, but Bowie took it from him and broke it in two. Then the big man pulled his knife.
"Stay back, Ord. The Alamo isn't worth the bones of a Britainer, either."
"Colonel Bowie, please," Ord cried. "You don't understand! You must defend the Alamo! This is the turning point in the winning of the west! If Houston is beaten, Texas will never join the Union! There will be no Mexican War. No California, no nation stretching from sea to shining sea! This is the Americans' manifest destiny. You are the hope of the future ... you will save the world from Hitler, from Bolshevism—"
"Crazy as a hoot owl," Bowie said sadly. "Ord, you and Travis got to look at it both ways. We ain't all in the right in this war—we Americans got our faults, too."
"But you are free men," Ord whispered. "Vulgar, opinionated, brutal—but free! You are still better than any breed who kneels to tyranny—"
Crockett came in. "O.K., Jim."
"How'd it go?"