After a long silence Jim said, “I told you he’d come back.”
“But he didn’t eat us,” replied Tom, determined that Jim should not be right in everything.
“He’d have eaten you, Limpy Fox, if Balser hadn’t been the best shot in the world.”
“That’s what he would,” answered Tom, half inclined to cry.
“Nonsense,” said Balser, “anybody could have done it.”
“Well, I reckon not” said Jim. “Me and Tom and the dogs and the bear was as thick as six in a bed; and honest, Balser, I think you had to shoot around a curve to miss us all but the bear.”
After a few minutes Jim said: “Golly! wasn’t that an awful fight we had in here before the bear got out?”
“Yes, it was,” returned Balser, seriously.
“Well, I rather think it was,” continued Jim. “Honestly, fellows, I ran around this here room so fast for a while, that—that I could see my own back most of the time.”
Balser and Tom laughed, and Tom said: “Jim, if you keep on improving, you’ll be a bigger liar than that fellow in the Bible before you’re half his age.”