"I guess I can get along without it," shortly. "I--" he caught himself
just in time from framing a self-extenuation. "I didn't have time--back
there," he digressed suddenly, "to thank you for what you did. I wish to
do so now." He was looking at the other squarely, as the smart civilian
observes the derelict who has saved his life in a runaway. Already,
there under the stars, it was difficult to credit to the full that
fantastic scene of an hour ago; and unconsciously a trace of the real
man, of condescension, crept into the tone. "You helped me out of a
nasty mess, and I appreciate it."

No answer. No polite lie, no derogation of self or of what had been
done. Just silence, attentive, but yet silence.

For the third time the white man hesitated, and for the third time his
face shaded red; consciously and against his will. Even the starlight
could not alter the obtrusive fact that he had cut a sorry figure in the
late drama, and his pride was sore. Extenuation, dissimulation even,
would have been a distinct solace. Looking at the matter now, the
excitement past, palliation for what he had done was easy, almost
logical. He had not alone conformed. He had but done, without
consideration, as the others with him had done. But even if it were not
so, back in the land from which he had come, a spade was not always so
called. His colour went normal at the recollection. The habitual, the
condescending pressed anew to the fore.

He inspected the silent figure at his side ingenuously, almost
quizzically; as in his schoolboy days he had inspected his plodding
master of physics before propounding a query no mortal could answer.