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He had learned long since that time took care of a lot of worries. Now he made himself grin at Anse. "Was worryin’ about wet feet before my boots were in the river again," he confessed. "Don’t let it git to be no habit," the Texan warned. "You try ridin’ with th’ bumps awhile, not agin them!" "Agreed."
Now they could see down the cut of the pass. The narrow passage wound between rocks and Drew, though he could not spot them, did not doubt that Rennie’s forces were snuggled in where a surprise volley could do the most good. "Somethin’ sure is comin’." Anse had one hand flat on the ground. "Feels like th’ whole danged army hoofin’ it an’ fast!"
And she told me something else, which explains why she felt she must send you away, why she thought your marriage to Grace would be a good thing." "I know. She told you that that darn scamp Anse Coffin was alive." The minister started violently. He gasped in surprise. "You knew it? You KNEW it?" he stammered. "I know it now. Have known it for over a year.
The mule galloped off in a restrained and dignified style until she was a hundred yards away, and then, having snorted the smells of burnt powder and fresh blood out of her nostrils, she fell to cropping the young leaves off the wayside bushes, mouthing the tender green shoots on her heavy iron bit contentedly. For a long minute Anse Dugmore stood in the narrow footpath, listening.
I thanked him stumblingly, and a moment later left him, to serve him on the morrow, and so on through many days, till, in divers perils, the camp at Montmorenci was abandoned, the troops were got aboard the ships, and the general took up his quarters on the Sutherland; from which, one notable day, I sallied forth with him to a point at the south shore opposite the Anse du Foulon, where he saw the thin crack in the cliff side.
"Might depend on what was in it," the Texan replied promptly. "Well, these were—" Anse took up the top book. His finger traced each word as he read. "The Three Mus—Musketeers. Whatever kinda critter is that?" "A soldier. They used to have them over in France a long time ago." "Army manual, eh? Maybe so the trunk was an army cache—" Drew shook his head. "No, this is just a story.
He appeared to be expecting some reply. What? A childish promise to be a good boy, not to do it again? Drew’s half-unconscious concern for this man burned away speedily, ignited by what he deemed injustice. Anse broke the too long silence. "I don’t know what you heard ’bout that there fight, suh," he drawled. "Can’t see as how we could have done no different nohow.
"This waitin’—" Anse sat cross-legged on the bunk next to Drew’s, his thumb spinning the rowel of one spur. "I never did take kindly to waitin’. Is he or ain’t he gonna sign me on?" Drew, lying flat, stared up at the muslin-covered ceiling which years of dust had turned to yellow-brown. "You ought to be used to it by now—waitin’, I mean. We had us plenty of it in the army."
"You were in Mexico?" Anse shook his head. "No, an’ Shannon ain’t there, neither. I trailed along—ridin’ th’ high lines careful—when he went with that there Mex Coronel an’ his men. Stayed with him ’bout a day, Shannon did. Then another man, Anglo, rode into their camp—had him a chin fest with Shannon, an’ Johnny saddled up pronto, beat it with th’ stranger.
Everything that could have been foreseen had already been amply provided for; and in his quiet confidence his followers found their own. Towards five o'clock two green rockets shot up from Montgomery's position beside the Anse des Meres under Cape Diamond. This was the signal for attack.
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