Jim Dent nodded at him with a friendly smile. "I know just how you feel, Jack," he said. "But the thing is pure necessity. If you hadn't shot that chap back in the path there, he'd have had Me Dain's head off as sure as sin, and after you shot him, the rest followed as straight as a string."
"True, Jim," said Jack, "the whole thing lies at their door."
"Say, Jack," murmured Buck, "you'd better get your Bisley bull's-eye trick on that jingal again. They're goin' to try another shot or two."
Jack ran to the window, and as he did so, the jingal roared, and crash came the heavy shot into the door. It struck a weak place, burst through, and rolled across the floor. In another moment Buck had picked it up and brought it forward.
"Say, boys," murmured Risley, "no wonder this jingal makes the poor old door crack. Look here!" He displayed a ball of iron, nearly the size of a cricket ball.
"By George! What a smasher!" said Dent. "The door's bound to go if they can get two or three of those straight on it."
Jack glanced at the heavy shot, then turned to the window to watch for the gunners in order to check them in working their destructive piece.
"I can't see them," he said. "There's no sign of them at all."
Jim and Buck joined him at once.
"There's the bunch of trees they were at work among," said Dent. "They must have drawn the jingal farther back into the jungle."