“You save life!” he grunted. “You good. I help!”
“That’s all right,” Tom said. “You great magic man, I only help.”
“Yes,” Toosa answered.
“Now, we sleep,” he said. Not one of the Indians went near the rude trough again. They trooped away, all except two he appointed to guard Henry in his small hut. Toosa picked up the rifle and walked off.
“He surely is a great magician,” Bill commented, as he and Tom lay on their rudely made bedding of woven vines and soft branches. “Henry, bad as he was, couldn’t have missed him with all those shells!”
“Well,” said Tom, nestling into a comfortable spot, “I don’t want to take any credit away from Toosa’s magic—but I helped it along a bit.”
“How?” demanded Bill, lifting to one elbow and staring into the blackness of the hut.
“I thought he might get boisterous—that Henry!” ‘Tom answered. “So I took the chance, while you and he dozed in the hut after supper, and dug the bullets out of his magazine full of cartridges.”
“Tom,” said Bill, soberly, “I never thought of that. You’re a pardner. Shake!”
Tom did.