Activate Javascript or update your browser for the full Digital Library experience.
Previous Page
–
Next Page
OCR
PITTSBURG LANDING. .21
Federal government of four such scoundrels, and I assure you not
a man would enter this room alive.”
Again growling voices were heard.
Evidently the quartette did not relish the situation.
For that matter I did not either. .
In spite of my reckless laughter and valiant words I was quite
uneasy.
This sort of thing was a new experience with me, and I would
not feel sorry when I could shake olf that feeling which hung like
a nightmare upon me. . p
“men I say this Ido not mean that I was afraid, for I have
already spoken of my feelings in this regard as of those which
came to a soldier in the heat of his first battle; still I preferred bee
ing in safety on board the Fleetwood.
I cast my eyes around.
The room did not offer many ideas, being so destitute of furnit-
ure, but my attention was at once directed to the window.
Before I could make a move, how ever, I heard one of my foes
climbing up the door, evidently with the intention of looking in at
the transom.
This was at the hall door.
I threw up my revolver.
One of his hands was in plain sight as he clasped the edge for
support, and at this I aimed.
Up came the face, pressed against the dusty, cobweb-covered
glass. At the same instant that I discovered the fellow who made
this daring venture to be Symes, I fired.
He went down with a crash and a howl.
I could hear him dancinga hornpipe out in the hall there that
must have been the devil’s own. I
At the same time, if oaths had possessed any mallgn influence, ‘I
must have been ilayed alive and roasted over hot coals by reason
of the enormity of my sin. ‘
The air seemed to actually smell of brimstone. ’
Taking advantage of this extraordinary state of affairs, I turned
my attention to the window.
To open this was an easy matter.
Before doing so I placed the chair in such a manner that no ob-
servations could be taken through the keyhole of the door leading
into the hall, and beyond which my foes seemed to be ‘congre-
gated.
The hour was growing rather late in the afternoon.
Not for the world would I miss being on board the boat -when
she slipped her moorings.
It was my intention to examine matters outside the window
with two objects in view.
The first of these was to determine whether it was possible for
me to attract the attention of any passing soldiers.