There was another pause, but Bob did not seem to mind. He went on again presently,—
"It is just this kind of thing, I always think, that gives one a bit of a useful warning: first, to be cautious; and second, to keep a cool head. You'll never go to sleep with a revolver ready cocked again, and another time you will give yourself a second's deliberation before you fire at anything looking like a man. It might have been Robertson making a tour of the house, you know."
Eustace felt suddenly rather sick.
"I never thought of that," he said.
"Of course not," was the cheery response. "One doesn't look all round a question in a hurry, but one has to learn to remember there may be two sides to it. You'll get the hang of the idea one of these days. I know it was a long time before I gave up wanting to shoot down everything I didn't quite like the looks of. Sometimes it turns out well, sometimes pretty badly."
He ended with a little laugh. Eustace, looking up into the merry, kindly face, knew that the awful time he had so dreaded was over, and it had not been an "awful time" after all. Bob did not think him a fool; he might have done the same himself, he said. He only warned him to be more careful another time, and gave him the reasons why he should.
The boy had always admired this friend of the family; he positively glowed with pride at this minute that Bob was a friend of his own. Whatever might happen now, whoever might snub or laugh at him, Eustace had this comforting knowledge always at heart—Bob understood, and Bob was a man no one would laugh at.
"He is a brick," thought the lad warmly. "I wish there was anything, anything in the world I could do to show him what a brick I think him. If ever there is, won't I just do it! The more dangerous it is the better."
"I remember once having a pretty gruesome experience," said Bob, chatting on easily. "I expect you've never heard about it, because you were nothing but a kiddy at the time, and it has been forgotten lately. I was going home across our plantation with two other fellows late at night—much later than the mater liked us to be out. In order to be as quick as possible, when we got to the little line running to the mill we hoisted the trolley on to the rails and began pushing ourselves along at a great rate. It was the sort of darkness one can peer through, making things look weird and distorted, often much bigger than they really are."
"Like the dingo."