He couldn't see the grin on her face, but knew it was there. "It was easy," she bragged. "One bad minute and then I checked with you and it was okay."
"Good kid. Pull the cartridges out of the links the way I showed you and pass them through."
She did. It was a tight squeeze.
He fingered one of the cartridges. The bullet fitted nicely into the socket of an arrowhead. He jammed the bullet in and wrenched at the arrowhead with thumb and forefinger—all he could get onto it. The brass neck began to spread. He dumped the powder into his little basin in the sand and reseated the bullet.
Charles shifted hands on the second cartridge. On the third he realized that he could put the point of the bullet on a hearth-stone and press on the neck with both thumbs. It went faster then; in perhaps an hour he was passing the re-assembled cartridges back through the palisade.
"Time for another load?" he asked.
"Nope," the girl said. "Tomorrow night."
"Good kid."
She giggled. "It's going to be a hell of a big bang, ain't it, Charles?"