one, Colonel, suh?"

Kitchell--if Kitchell that shadow was--came out into the moonlight. He wore
the gray shell jacket of a Confederate cavalryman, and the light glinted
on the cords of a field officer's hat.

"Who are you, boy?" He faced to the left and Drew looked in the same
direction.

Anse stood there, the barrel of a Colt pushed against him just above the
belt line.

"Anson Kirby."

Shannon laughed again. "'Nother big man--says he rode with General
Forrest!"

"That true, Kirby, you were one of General Forrest's command?"

"It's true," Anse drawled. "Mean's nothin' now, th' war's long gone,
hombre."

"Maybe it's over back east--not here! You stayed to the end, boy?"

"Yankees took me prisoner before that."

"Sergeant Wayne!"

"Yes, suh?" Anse's captor responded.

"Put him to sleep!"

18

Drew lunged and then reeled back as Shannon laid the barrel of his Colt
alongside the Kentuckian's head. He was half dazed from the blow but he
managed to get out his protest.

"You murderin' butcher!"

"Kirby ain't dead, he'll just have a sore head tomorrow," Kitchell
returned, as the man he called Sergeant Wayne straightened up from the
Texan's crumpled form. "And you--you keep a civil tongue in your head when
addressing a superior officer. Shannon, no more of that!" The order stayed
a second blow.

"Oughta shot him for real, suh."

"No. Not a man who rode with General Forrest." Kitchell hesitated and then
added, "We'll be long gone before he wakes. Tie this one in the saddle if
he can't hang on by himself. You may be right, Shannon, about him having
his uses in the future."

"Say, Colonel, this here gray hoss, he's got hisself all hurted bad. Can't
nohow go 'long with us. Want I should shoot 'im?" That whine came from the
meadow where they had left the horses.

"No, leave him. Won't do Kirby any good and that's a fine horse--might just
see him again some day. Sergeant, you fill all the canteens; take any
supplies you find here. Then we'll move out."

Drew, his wrists corded to the saddle horn, both ankles lashed to the
stirrups, swayed in the saddle as Shannon took the reins of his horse and
led it along. The pain in his head and the agony in his side resulting
from even the most shallow breaths, brought on a kind of red mist which
shut off most of the surrounding night. He had no idea how the outlaws had
managed to jump the camp. And who was the extra man with them now? Only
three had esc