"Armed?"
"Sure! This is a bear country, you know."
"Listen! I want you to tell him, as innocently as you can, that we're on the job ahead of him. Tell him we've been there for a week and have loaded that first rock shoulder and expect to shoot it off as soon as possible. You can tell him, too, that I'm up there and he'd better see me before trying to pass through."
"I've got you! But that won't stop him."
"Perhaps! Now have you any grub in camp?"
"No."
"We threw ours overboard, to make time. Send up anything you can spare; we're played out."
"It'll be nothing but beans, and they're moldy."
"We can fight on beans, and we'll eat the paper off those giant cartridges if we have to. Don't fail to warn Gordon that the hillside is mined, and warn him loud enough for his swampers to hear."
Appleton hastened back to his boats, where he found his men sprawled among the boulders sleeping the sleep of complete exhaustion. They were drenched, half numbed by the chill air of the glacier, and it was well that he roused them.