nger than my
ward, for I felt a sharp sting in my face just below the left eye,
and a moment later the warm blood trickled down my cheek. With my
left hand I grabbed his wrist just below the thumb and gripped it
like grim death, but he was not to be beaten thus. I felt the sinews
of his wrist rise, and the grinding of the muscles, and then the same
stinging sensation that I had felt in my face I now felt in my wrist.

I could count the cuts as he made them--one, two, three--all on my
left wrist and hand, and then the blood began to run down my forearm,
as our hands were elevated.

This occupied but a second of time. He raised his left hand, and I saw
another flash. What it was I knew not, but I immediately grasped his
wrist and tried to force this hand behind him. Before I could do so,
he fired, and the ball passed through my left boot-leg. The muzzle
was so close to me that the force of the powder almost threw me to
the earth. I ground my teeth in a desperate effort to force his hand
behind him. My left hand, cut and bleeding, still held his right. Now
forcing the fight with the revolver, he tried vainly to raise it and
shoot me in the body. Throwing my whole strength on my right arm,
I succeeded in forcing back his revolver hand. At this he began to
shoot at my feet.

The first shot missed, but he immediately followed it with another. It
struck, for my right foot felt as if it had been hit with a club,
and grew numb. Four more shots came in quick succession. One of
them--which I cannot tell--struck the same foot and broke the bridge,
as I knew from the immediate loss of strength in that member.

Now all was quiet. We stood with our heaving chests touching. I
felt his breath in my face, and his heart palpitating against my
breast. There was a lull in the battle. I felt safe, as far as
the revolver was concerned, for he had emptied that, but the deadly
knife was still poised over my head. My life depended entirely on the
strength of my wounded hand and wrist, which were holding the knife
away from my throat.

Now I remembered that bolomen never travel alone. That he had comrades
within a few feet of me, who were trying to distinguish between us,
so that they might be sure that their knifes should enter my back
instead of his, I was certain. My flesh cringed at the thought;
I could almost feel the cold steel enter my body.

It was time for me to force the fight. My right foot was badly
wounded, but the knee was y