“‘I’m not,’ says I.  ’If I was, I’d knock some of the pallidness off of your marble brow.  I’m lenient with you,’ I says, ’just as I am with the Spaniards, because you have always reminded me of something with mushrooms on the side.  Why, you little Lady of Shalott,’ says I, ’you underdone leader of cotillions, you glassy fashion and moulded form, you white-pine soldier made in the Cisalpine Alps in Germany for the late New-Year trade, do you know of whom you are talking to?  We’ve been in the same social circle,’ says I, ’and I’ve put up with you because you seemed so meek and self-un-satisfying.  I don’t understand why you have so sudden taken a personal interest in chivalrousness and murder.  Your nature’s undergone a complete revelation.  Now, how is it?’

“‘Well, you wouldn’t understand, Ben,’ says Willie, giving one of his refined smiles and turning away.

“‘Come back here!’ says I, catching him by the tail of his khaki coat.  ’You’ve made me kind of mad, in spite of the aloofness in which I have heretofore held you.  You are out for making a success in this hero business, and I believe I know what for.  You are doing it either because you are crazy or because you expect to catch some girl by it.  Now, if it’s a girl, I’ve got something here to show you.’

“I wouldn’t have done it, but I was plumb mad.  I pulled a San Augustine paper out of my hip-pocket, and showed him an item.  It was a half a column about the marriage of Myra Allison and Joe Granberry.

“Willie laughed, and I saw I hadn’t touched him.

“‘Oh,’ says he, ’everybody knew that was going to happen.  I heard about that a week ago.’  And then he gave me the laugh again.

“‘All right,’ says I.  ’Then why do you so recklessly chase the bright rainbow of fame?  Do you expect to be elected President, or do you belong to a suicide club?’

“And then Captain Sam interferes.

“‘You gentlemen quit jawing and go back to your quarters,’ says he, ’or I’ll have you escorted to the guard-house.  Now, scat, both of you!  Before you go, which one of you has got any chewing-tobacco?’

“‘We’re off, Sam,’ says I.  ’It’s supper-time, anyhow.  But what do you think of what we was talking about?  I’ve noticed you throwing out a good many grappling-hooks for this here balloon called fame—­What’s ambition, anyhow?  What does a man risk his life day after day for?  Do you know of anything he gets in the end that can pay him for the trouble?  I want to go back home,’ says I.  ’I don’t care whether Cuba sinks or swims, and I don’t give a pipeful of rabbit tobacco whether Queen Sophia Christina or Charlie Culberson rules these fairy isles; and I don’t want my name on any list except the list of survivors.  But I’ve noticed you, Sam,’ says I, ’seeking the bubble notoriety in the cannon’s larynx a number of times.  Now, what do you do it for?  Is it ambition, business, or some freckle-faced Phoebe at home that you are heroing for?’