When at length the meal was finished Monitaya commanded the girls to stand before him and narrate their experiences. The men lit smokes, José seizing the proffered cigarette with avidity, Rand accepting his with the usual odd deliberation. "Wal, Hozy, old feller, ye're in right with the chief now," asserted Tim. "Ye got all our gang with ye, and she's some li'l' old gang, I'll tell the world. This feller Renzo can talk cannibal so good he makes Monitaya hunt for the dictionary, and he'll tell the chief in ten seconds what I tried half an hour to say this afternoon--that ye belong. I 'ain't been here long enough to learn much o' their lingo, ye understand. If I could spout it like French, now, there wouldn't been no trouble." McKay and Knowlton snickered. They knew Tim's French was several degrees worse than the usual American doughboy's "frog" talk. "Good thing you couldn't," derided Knowlton. "You'd have had José crucified before we got here." "That's right, gimme the razz! Course, I did have a li'l' trouble makin' some o' them frogs understand, but that was because they was so ignorant they didn't know their own language when they heard it spoke right. Anyways, ye got to admit Hozy's still with us and sassy as ever, and he wouldn't been if Timmy Ryan hadn't been round to powwow for him." "You have it right, señor," José agreed, gravely. "Without you I should now be dead. I can speak the Mayoruna tongue quite well, but of what use is it to talk any language when men will not listen? It was you and your gun that saved me." "Gun? Good Lord! Did you pull a gun on Monitaya?" ejaculated the lieutenant. "Aw, no. That is--I guess mebbe I did wave me piece around while I was arguin'--I can always convince a guy better if I got somethin' in me hand. But I didn't git real rough." "You are lucky to be still alive, Senhor Tim," said Lourenço. "If Monitaya were not the man he is you would not be alive. I am glad we have returned." "Meanin' I need a guardeen? Say, lookit here now--" "As you were!" clipped McKay. "We're all wasting time. José, let's hear your report. I thought you were going to put Schwandorf out of action for good?" "And I am, Capitan! That is why I now am here. If I had reached him immediately after leaving the Nunes place it would have been done at once. But a man travels slowly when he is alone and has lost much blood, and before I met Schwandorf again I had time to think coolly. Then when I saw him I changed my plans. "Some days down the river I met him traveling fast in a canoe paddled by hard men whom I know. He pretended to be greatly grieved when I told him you all were dead. Oh yes, señores, I told him that! I was playing with him, and it amused me to see how he thought he was deceiving me when I was really fooling him. I said we were attacked by Indians a short way above the Nunes place and that I alone escaped. Then he said something that made me decide not to kill him for a time.