about a stand-off; so both of them had to whoop up their dangerous
adventures, and try to get ahead THAT way. That bullet-wound in Tom's leg
was a tough thing for Nat Parsons to buck against, but he bucked the best
he could; and at a disadvantage, too, for Tom didn't set still as he'd
orter done, to be fair, but always got up and sauntered around and worked
his limp while Nat was painting up the adventure that HE had in
Washington; for Tom never let go that limp when his leg got well, but
practiced it nights at home, and kept it good as new right along.

Nat's adventure was like this; I don't know how true it is; maybe he got
it out of a paper, or somewhere, but I will say this for him, that he DID
know how to tell it. He could make anybody's flesh crawl, and he'd turn
pale and hold his breath when he told it, and sometimes women and girls
got so faint they couldn't stick it out. Well, it was this way, as near
as I can remember:

He come a-loping into Washington, and put up his horse and shoved out to
the President's house with his letter, and they told him the President
was up to the Capitol, and just going to start for Philadelphia--not a
minute to lose if he wanted to catch him. Nat 'most dropped, it made him
so sick. His horse was put up, and he didn't know what to do. But just
then along comes a darky driving an old ramshackly hack, and he see his
chance. He rushes out and shouts: "A half a dollar if you git me to the
Capitol in half an hour, and a quarter extra if you do it in twenty
minutes!"

"Done!" says the darky.

Nat he jumped in and slammed the door, and away they went a-ripping and
a-tearing over the roughest road a body ever see, and the racket of it