Soon Jack again opened his eyes and smiled as he glanced about him.
“White boy chew,” Kernertok ordered, as he knelt beside him and forced something between his teeth. “Injun had heap big hunt before find it,” he said, looking up at Bob.
At first Jack’s jaws moved but slowly, but as his strength began to return, he chewed faster.
“That heap good,” the Indian declared, as he put more of the crushed leaves in the boy’s mouth.
Rex was astonished at the rapidity of Jack’s recovery, but Bob, who knew something of the medicine which Kernertok had found, took it more as a matter of course. It was not long before Jack was able to sit up.
“How’d I get out?” he asked.
“If it hadn’t been for Sicum—” Bob began, but Rex interrupted him.
“Look at the dog,” he cried.
Sicum stood a few feet away wagging his tail violently, a thing he had not done since he had been beaten. It was the first time Bob had thought of the dog, and now he sprang toward him, and taking his shaggy head in his arms, he hugged him to his breast. Sicum accepted the caress with a low whine.
“Good old boy,” Bob whispered. “If it hadn’t been for you Jack would have been a goner for sure that time.”