Down deep in his heart a calm voice seemed to be repeating Long-Hair's Indian sentence--"Wait here a little while." A few minutes later Long-Hair returned bearing two guns, Beverley's and his own, the latter, a superb weapon given him by Hamilton.

He afterward explained that he had brought these, with their bullet-pouches and powder-horns, to a place of concealment near by before he awoke Beverley.

This meant that he had swum the cold river three times since night-fall; once over with the guns and accouterments; once back to camp, then over again with Beverley! All this with a broken arm, and to repay Alice for her kindness to him.
Beverley may have been slow, but at last his appreciation was, perhaps, all the more profound.

As best he could he expressed it to Long-Hair, who showed no interest whatever in the statement.

Instead of responding in Indian, he said "damn" without emphasis.