asts in the
first fierceness of attack. His revolver jammed in its holster, but he
struck out with clenched fists, battering at the black figures, his
teeth ground together, his every instinct bidding him fight hard till
he died. Once they pounded him to his knees, but he struggled up,
shaking loose their gripping hands, and hurling them back like so many
children. He was crazed by then with raging battle-fury, his hot blood
lusting, every great muscle strained to the uttermost. He realized
nothing, saw nothing, but those dim figures facing him; insensible to
the blood trickling down the front of his shirt, unconscious of wound,
he flung himself forward a perfect madman, jerking a rifle from the
helpless fingers of an opponent, and smiting to right and left, the
deadly-iron bar whirling through the air. He struck once, twice; he
saw bodies whirl sidewise and fall to the ground. Then suddenly he
seemed alone, panting fiercely, the smashed rifle-stock uplifted for a
blow.

"It's the big fellow," roared a voice at his left. "Why don't you
fools shoot?"

He sprang backward, crouching lower, his one endeavor to draw their
fire, so as to protect her lying hidden among the rock shadows. He
felt nothing except contempt for those fellows, but he could not let
them hurt her. He stood up full in the starlight, shading his eyes in
an attempt to see. Somebody cried, "There he is, damn him!" A slender
figure swept flying across the open space like some dim night vision.
A red flame leaped forth from the blackness. The two stood silhouetted
against the glare, reeled backward as it faded, and went down together
in the dark.

CHAPTER XXVI

BENEATH THE DARKNESS

Running blindly through the darkness toward the sound of struggle came
Hicks and Winston. They caught no more than faint glimpses of
scattering, fleeing figures, but promptly opened fire, scarcely
comprehending as yet what it all meant. Hicks, dashing recklessly
forward, tripped over a recumbent figure in the darkness, and the two
paused irresolutely, perceiving no more of the enemy. Then it was that
Stutter Brown struggled slowly up upon his knees, still closely
clasping the slender figure of the stricken girl within his arms. She
neither moved nor moaned, but beneath the revealing starlight her eyes
were widely opened, gazing up into his face, appearing marvellously
brilliant against the unusual pallor of her cheeks. Her breath came
short and shar