“I took your rifle out of the boat and fired at him,” he added, apologetically, “because if I hadn’t got the rifle he’d have bloomin’ well got it, an’ it’s my opinion he’d a cleared the whole camp out afore he’d a stopped!”
“See what you missed, Sour Krout!” cried Dave, using the paddle as a jumping pole, and leaping about in a delirium of derisive joy.
Petit ground his teeth savagely and glared at his captors.
“Wouldn’t you like to be loose!” yelled Dave, who was more or less hysterical. “Wouldn’t you like me to untie you! Yah!”
Dan turned to George:
“Let us go and see if the money is really there!” he said.
“It’s there!” cried Dave. “I see him drop it when Tom fired! You wait!”
The excited first mate made a bolt into the scrub, and returned in a few minutes heavily laden.
“There!” he cried, triumphantly, throwing the canvas bag containing the plunder of the Bulk and Bullion on the ground at Dan Creyton’s feet. “Now you’ll believe what we say is true!”