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 a collection of buttons and buckles and dice and moonstones, and it happened to just about clean out the treasury. There wasn’t much left. But your partner won a bet that was going to bring in two bits, so bankruptcy is not looming. I happened to be a witness to the winning of the bet. An accurately directed stream of saliva hit a bumblebee at about ten paces and knocked it off a red creeper.”

A dry chuckle shook the frame of the Bee Master.

“Good work!” he said, heartily. “My partner can be depended upon to hit ’most anything that happens to be the mark that’s aimed at.”

“And your partner,” said Jamie, “has got a heart that’s filled with love for you, love so deep and of such a nature that I truly believe that the offer to give a right hand that would be needed in riding a horse, in paddling a boat, in managing the Scouts, nevertheless, the offer freely and honestly made, of that same right hand in your behalf if it would ease the pain and bring you home safe and well.” The Bee Master shut his eyes tight and lay there fingering the dime and the two nickels. By and by he smiled stiffly at Jamie.

“You need not doubt the loyalty or the sincerity of that offer,” he said. “And you need not doubt that it would have been heroically fulfilled had necessity arisen. And you need not doubt, on my part, that in all the world there is no one left half so dear to me as the little fellow. One of the reasons I’d like to live is that I might go on further in what I am trying to teach that particular youngster