"Shorty," said Si firmly, "it's got to be done. She's got a pass, and the right to go into camp. We're both o' the opinion that she's carryin' in whisky. If she was a man there'd be no doubt that she'd have to be searched. I don't understand that the law{177} knows any difference in persons. No matter what you may think about it, it is your duty, as Corporal o' the Guard, to make the search." "No, sir-ree," insisted Shorty. "You're Sergeant o' the Guard, and it's your dooty to make all searches." "Shorty," expostulated Si, "I'm much younger and modester'n you are, an' haint seen nearly so much o' the world. You ought to do this. Besides, you're under my orders, as Actin' Corporal. I order you to make the search." "Si Klegg," said Shorty firmly, "I'll see you and all the Corporals and Sergeants betwixt here and Washington in the middle o' next week before I'll do it. You may buck-and-gag me, and tie me up by the thumbs, and then I won't. I resign my position as Corporal right here, and'll take by gun and go on post." "What in the world are we goin' to do?" said Si desperately. "If we let her in, she'll fill the camp full o' whisky, and she'll have to go in, unless we kin show some reason for keepin' her out. Hold on; I've got an idee." He went up to the woman and said: "You say you want to go into camp to sell your pies?" "Yes, sir, an' I want to go in right off--no more foolin' around," she answered tartly. "How many pies've you got?" She went through a laborious counting, and finally announced: "Eight altogether." "How much are they worth?" "Fifty cents apiece."{178} "Very good," announced Si taking some money from his pocket. "That comes to $4. I'll take the lot and treat the boys. Here's your money. Now you've got no more business in camp, jest turn around and mosey for home. You've made a good day's business, and ought to be satisfied." The woman scowled with disappointment. But she wisely concluded that she h'd better be content with the compromise, remounted her horse and disappeared down the road. "That was a sneak out of a difficulty," Si confessed to Shorty; "but you were as big a coward as I was." "No, I wasn't," insisted Shorty, still watchful. "You'd no right to order me do something that you was afraid to do yourself. That's no kind o' officering." {179} CHAPTER XIII. THE JEW SPY WRITES SHORTY HAS AN ADVENTURE WITH A LONE, LORN WIDDER LADY." "I WONDER what has become of our Jew spy, Shorty?" said Si, as he and Shorty sat on the bank of Duck River and watched the rebel pickets lounging under the beeches on the other side. "We hain't heard nothin' of him for more'n a month now." "He's probably hung," answered Shorty. "He was entirely too smart to live long. A man can't go on always pokin' his finger into a rattlesnake's jaw without gittin' it nipped sooner or later."