"Paul," he said, "I wish I wuz in your place for an hour or two. They've jest got to wait on you. Nobody ever believes me when I say I'm sick, though I'm took pow'ful bad sometimes, an' they don't care whether I'm tired or not. Now, Paul, take all the advantages o' your position. Don't you reach your hand for a thing. Make 'em bring it to you. Ef I can't get waited on myself, I like to see another fellow waited on. Here, Saplin', some more o' that buffalo steak for Paul, who is mighty hungry."
Saplin' cast a look of scorn upon Shif'less Sol, but he brought the steak, and Paul ate again, for he was voraciously hungry. But one cannot eat always, and by and by he had enough. Then his restful, dreamy feeling grew. He saw Henry and the men talking, but he either did not hear what they said or he was not interested. Soon the whole world faded out, and he slept soundly. And as he slept the touch of fever left him. Shif'less Sol looked down at him kindly.
"I'm tired, too," he said, "but I suppose if I wuz to go to sleep some o' you 'ud be mean enough to shove me in the side with his foot."
"I'd try to be the first," said Jim Hart, "an' I'd shove pow'ful hard."
"It 'ud be jest like you," said Shif'less Sol, "but I suppose you can't any more help bein' mean, Jim, than I can help bein' tired."
Jim shrugged his shoulders and returned to his cooking, his tall, lean form bent over like a hoop. Paul slept peacefully on the blanket, but the others talked much and earnestly. Henry, as he ate of the buffalo meat, told them all that had happened to him and Paul in that brief period which yet looked so long. That the band would pick up the trail, daylight now come, and follow on, he did not doubt. There he stopped, and left the conclusion to the others. Shif'less Sol was the first to speak.
"This gang," he said, "come out to hunt buffalo, an', accordin' to what Henry says, a war party—he don't know how big—is comin' this way huntin' him an' Paul. Well, ef it keeps on huntin' him an' Paul, it's bound to run up agin us, because Paul an' Henry are now a part o' our gang. Ez fur me, I've done a lot o' trampin' after buffalo, an' I feel too tired to run, I jest do."
"I ain't seen no better place for cookin' than this," said Jim Hart, undoubling himself, "an' I like the looks o' the country round here pow'ful well. I'd hate to leave it before I got ready,"
"'Tain't healthy to run afore you're ready," said Ike Stebbins, a short, extremely thick man. "It ain't good for the stomach. Pumps the blood right up to the heart, an' I ain't feelin' very good just now, noway. Can't afford to take no more risks to my health."
A slight smile passed over the stern, bronzed face of Tom Ross.