He was so stubborn an' headstrong that here I am ready to become a statesman in this new Texas which is fightin' for its independence.

An' what a change! From marble halls in Washington to a night in the brush on the frontier, an' with an unknown enemy before you." They stopped talking now and, kneeling down in a thicket, began to creep forward.

The cabin was not more than four or five hundred yards away, but a long silence had succeeded the latest shots, and after an advance of thirty or forty yards they lay still for a while.

Then they heard two shots ahead of them, and saw little pink dots of flame from the exploding gunpowder.
"It cannot be Mexicans who are besieging the cabin," said Ned.

"They would shout or make some kind of a noise.