"Or killing you or Fox-Foot," supplemented the boy.
"Same thing," said Larry. "We are all one in this matter, but I don't want you to be sorry in after years that you pulled a gun too quickly, that is all."
"No gun," joined Fox-Foot, slyly. "You leave the man to me. I fix him."
"I guess that's right," answered Larry. "Foxy's the boy to trip up Mr. Mackinaw in his nice little race for what does not belong to him. Now, boys, for supper, but we'll tuck away these pretty little playthings first."
The nuggets were divided into two stout canvas sacks, which were never to leave the lynx eyes of these three adventurers. They were to eat off those sacks, sleep on them, sit on them, think of them, dream of them, work for them, swim for them, fight for them. That was the vow that these three sturdy souls and manly hearts made one to another, before they sat down to bacon and beans, in the vast wilderness of the North, that glorious summer night.
"Downy pillow, this!" growled Larry, as he folded his sweater over a gold sack to get at least a semblance of softness for his ear to burrow into.
"Never mind, Larry, you can swap it for a good slice of 'down' when we get to the front," said Jack from the depths of his blankets. "It strikes me that it will be the cause of your sleeping on 'down' for the rest of your life."
"I shall never sleep or rest for long, son, nor do I want a downy life, but there is a difference between rose leaves and these bulky nuggets prodding a fellow in the neck."
"You sleep on blankets, I sleep on the wampum," said Fox-Foot, extracting with his slim brown fingers the "pillow" from beneath Larry's tired head.
"All right, Foxy," murmured the man, sleepily. "The gold only goes to itself when it goes to you. You're gold right through and through. Good-night."