"Then you've come just in time," said the older man. "We've heard that a
big force under General Urrea was heading for the settlements near the
coast, and Captain King and twenty-five or thirty men are now at Refugio
to take the people away. We'll hurry there with your news and we'll try
to get you a saddle and bridle, too."
"For which I'll be thankful," said Ned.
But he was really more thankful for human companionship than anything
else. He tingled with joy to be with the Texans again, and during the
hours that they were riding to Refugio he willingly answered the
ceaseless questions of the two men, Oldham and Jackson, who wanted to
know everything that had happened at the Alamo. When they reached
Refugio they found there Captain King with less than thirty men who had
been sent by Fannin, as Jackson had said, to bring away the people.
Ned was taken at once to King, who had gathered his men in the little
plaza. He saw that the soldiers were not Texans, that is, men who had
long lived in Texas, but fresh recruits from the United States, wholly
unfamiliar with border ways and border methods of fighting. The town
itself was an old Mexican settlement with an ancient stone church or
mission, after the fashion of the Alamo, only smaller.
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