be better dead than alive a coward. He believed cowardice exceptional
and the brave man the rule, but he was not prepared for Abe's coolness
and his humour. Never did the Westerner's voice change, and never did
the grim half-smile leave his eyes or his mouth. Once during the fight
he took off his hat.

"How's my hair parted?" he asked, quietly.

A Mauser bullet had mowed a path through Abe's thick, upright hair,
scraping the skin for three inches, and leaving a trail of tiny, red
drops. Crittenden turned to look and laugh, and a bullet cut through the
open flap of his shirt, just over his heart. He pointed to it.

"See the good turn you did me."

While the two were cooking supper, the old Sergeant came up.

"If you don't obey orders next time," he said to Crittenden, sternly,
for Abe was present, "I'll report you to the Captain." Crittenden had
declined to take shelter during the fight--it was a racial inheritance
that both the North and the South learned to correct in the old war.

"That's right, Governor," said Abe.

"The Colonel himself wanted to know what damn fool that was standing out
in the road. He meant you."

"All right, Sergeant," Crittenden said.

When he came in from guard duty, late that night, he learned that Basil