"It seemed as if I could not miss, Jack; but I do not care to go through that ordeal again."
"Nor I, Ronie. But now that we are safe, let's look after the chap over our heads. It must be he needs our aid bad enough. I never saw one in just such a predicament."
The hapless man had ceased his outcries, and was trying to find out what had taken place underneath him, and as to what bearing it would have upon his fate. Seeing no other way to reach him, Ronie immediately climbed the tree holding him. His weight, added to that of the other's, caused the sapling to bend so that Jack was soon able to reach the poor fellow by standing under him.
"A little lower, lad, and I shall be able to get him. His feet are caught in the tree's bootjack, but I—there! I have got him free and clear. Look out that the tree doesn't hang you up."
Jack quickly laid the man upon the ground, and began to straighten out his limp limbs.
"Has he fainted?" asked Ronie, quickly joining him by springing from the tree to the earth, leaving the sapling to leap back into its normal position with a force that cut the air like a lash.
"He is overcome by his experience. But he'll soon come out all right, as I do not see that he has been injured more than a few scratches. Looks like a tolerable sort of a fellow for a South American. Got a little of the native blood in him mixed up with the Spanish. He belongs to the common class."
The man was a person of middle age, of slight figure, but wiry build. He presented a somewhat warlike nature by the armament he carried about his body. This consisted of a pair of heavy pistols, a huge knife, and inside his stout jacket a pair Of smaller pistols were to be seen. He also had fastened about his waist by a belt a good stock of cartridges, evidently for the firearm Ronie had picked up. Certainly it had not been for a lack of means of defense that he had fared so roughly in his meeting with the jaguar.
It seemed like a long time to our friends before he opened his eyes and revived enough to seek a sitting posture. Then he rubbed his head, stared stupidly about, and tried to regain his feet, giving expression to his surprise in Spanish. Both Jack and Ronie were able to converse in that language, and Jack at once assured him of his safety at that moment.
He was profuse in his thanks, though somewhat reticent in regard to himself. He had climbed a tree near the sapling, but somehow had lost his footing and fallen into the topmost branches of the latter. Lodging between the branches of this his weight had brought it and him into the positions in which they had been found. The jaguar had come along, and discovering him began at once its attempted attack. That was what Jack and Ronie made out of his disjointed account.