My rifle was in the boot, and to reach for it would mean death.  My pistol, in its holster, was held down by the thong hooked over the hammer, a necessity when riding rough country.

So I rode straight for them, pointing the dun to ride right between two of them who rode some thirty yards apart, and singing as I rode.

Nobody ever figured a way to account for the thinking of an Indian.  They were curious as any wild animal, and at times as temperamental, but the thing they admired most was courage, because you needed courage to be a good Indian.  I knew I wouldn't get anywhere now trying to run; and when it comes to that, I am not a man who cares to run, unless it's toward something.

That dun pricked up his ears.  He knew we were in trouble, and he didn't like the smell of Indians; I could feel every muscle in him poised with eagerness to take out and run.

These braves weren't hunting me.  They were a war party all right, and they were out for bigger game.  But if they were fixing for trouble with me they were going to get it.  As I walked my horse toward them I made up my mind what to do.  The big Indian on the right was my meat.  If they made a hostile move I'd jump my horse into him, and grab for my pistol.  I went through the motions in my mind, and all the while I was singing about that girl I left in San Antone.

Behind me I could hear the riders closing in, and in front of me they had slowed their horses a little, but I kept right on riding.  My right hand was on my thigh, where it had been all along, only inches from the butt of my gun.  I knew that if I got my gun out before they killed me I wouldn't go alone.  If there was one thing I could do well in this world it was shoot a pistol.

Back in the Clinch Mountains in the fifties and sixties a boy just naturally cut his teeth on guns, and befor I was twelve years old I'd been out in the woods feeding the family with a rifle, and with little time for anything else.

My eyes held straight ahead, yet I was watching the Indian on either side of me.  There were a-plenty of others there, but it was those two who would bring on the trouble and they were coming closer and closer.  My spur was just caressing that bronc's flank, ready to nudge him into action.

Those Indians came right on and I rode right toward them.  Of a sudden the one on my left brought his lance down slowly, pointing it at me, but I never flinched.  Had I showed one sign of the scare that was in me, he'd have run me through, or tried it.

He put the point of that lance right against my chest, and I looked over it and right into his eyes.  I put my left hand up, still holding the reins, and pushed the point aside, just nice and easy, and then I walked my horse right on past.