“I think so. Did you jump after me?” The thought had suggested itself to Diego at once on finding Juan in the water.
“Yes; I couldn’t help it.”
Diego said nothing for a few minutes. He was thinking how true a friend Juan was; but a boy generally finds it hard to express gratitude for a service such as Juan had wished to do him.
“I can’t fight you now, can I?” he said.
A strange thing to say, lying there on an inverted canoe, with the cold touch of death almost on them; but Juan understood, and that was enough.
“Oh, we are quits,” he said. “I should have drowned if you had not saved me.”
“You wouldn’t have been in danger if it hadn’t been for me,” said Diego.
“HE REACHED OUT AND CLUTCHED AT THE FLOATING THING.”