infernal
old town and touch a match to it. That's what I'd do if I had my way.
There's more, brimstone trouble to the acre in Nashville than in any
town on the footstool, not barring even Richmond."

"Nashville certainly is tough," sighed Shorty. "'Specially in gamblers.
Worst tin-horn crowd that ever fumbled a deck or skinned a greeny out
o' the last cent o' his bounty. Say, Si, do you remember that tin-horny
that I cleaned out o' his whole pile down there at Murfreesboro, with
them cards that I'd clipped with a pair o' scissors, so's I'd know 'em
by the feel, and he never ketched on till his last shinplaster was gone,
and then I throwed the pack in the fire? Well, I seen him down there at
the depot smellin' around for suckers. I told him to let our boys alone
or I'd snap his neck off short. Great Jehosephat, but I wanted a chance
to git up town and give some o' them cold-deckers a whirl."

"Well," said Conductor Madden, after some deliberation, "I believe what
you boys say. You're not the kind to get rattled and make rebels out
of cedar-bushes. All the same, there's nothing to do but go ahead. My
orders were to take this train through to Chattanooga as quick as I
could. I can't stop on a suspicion."

"No, indeed," assented Si and Shorty.

"There's no place to telegraph from till we get to Bridgeport, on the
Tennessee, and if we could telegraph they wouldn't pay any attention to
mere reports of having seen rebels at a distance. They want something
more substantial than that."

"Of course they do, and very properly," said Si. "Is your engineer all
right?"

"Game as they make 'em, and loyal as Abraham Lincoln himself," responded
the conductor.

"Well, I believe our boys 's all right. They're green, and they're
friskier than colts in a clover field, but they're all good stuff, and
I believe we kin stand off any ordinary gang o' guerrillas. I'll chance
it, anyhow. This's a mighty valuable train to risk, but it ought to go
through, for we don't know how badly they may need it. You tell your
engineer to go ahead carefully and give two long whistles if he sees
anything dangerous."

"I'll go and git onto the engine with him," said Shorty.

"Wait a little," said Si. "We'll get the boys together, issue 'em
catridges and give 'em a little preparation for a light, if we're to
have one."

The sun had gone down and the night was at hand. The train had stopped
to take on a supply of wood from a pile by the roadside. Som