The scowling man, with a glance at his comrades' faces, gave way.
I could not have told why, but from the start of the dispute I felt
that this girl held her bandits, or whatever they were, in imperfect
obedience. They obeyed her, yet with reserve. When pressed to the
point between submission and mutiny, they yielded; but they yielded
with a consent which I could not reconcile with submission.
Even whilst answering deferentially they appeared to be looking at
one another and taking a cue.
For the time, however, she had prevailed with them. They stood aside
while Billy and I lifted the litter and bore it to the shade of an
overhanging rock. One even fetched me a panful of water which he had
collected from a trickling spring on the face of the cliffs hard by,
and brought me linen, too, when he saw me preparing to tear up my own
shirt to bind Nat's wound.
We could not trace the course of the bullet, and judged it best to
spare meddling with a hurt we could not help. So, having bathed away
the clotted blood and bandaged him, we strewed a fresh bed of fern,
and watched by him, moistening his lips from time to time with water,
for which he moaned.
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