hand,
and at his feet lay the keg of powder with a long fuse attached to the
open bung-hole!

CHAPTER XXV.

MARCH OF SANTA ANNA INTO TEXAS.

"You rascal! Get back, or I'll shoot!"

[Illustration: "'YOU RASCAL! GET BACK, OR I'LL SHOOT!'"]

Such were the words which burst from Dan's lips as soon as he recovered
sufficiently from his surprise to speak.

But Hank Stiger was already retreating, carrying the lighted tinder in
his hand. He could not make out who was there, but saw it was somebody
with a gun, and the sight of the weapon was enough for him.

"What's up?" came from Poke Stover, who had been snoring in the corner,
and the old frontiersman scrambled to his feet and joined Dan at the
doorway.

"There goes Hank Stiger! He was going to blow up the cabin with our keg
of gunpowder."

"Can it be possible! I'll stop him." Stover ran outside. "Stop, Hank
Stiger, or you're a dead man!" he called out, loudly.

But the half-breed was now running like a deer and paid no attention to
the words. Taking hasty but careful aim at Stiger's legs, Poke Stover
pulled the trigger of his gun.

The report, which awakened all of the others, was followed by a scream
of pain from the half-breed, who went a step or two more and then sank
in a heap.

"What does this mean?" demanded Amos Radbury, as he, too, seized his
gun. "Are we attacked by Indians?"

"No, we were attacked by Hank Stiger," answered Dan, and pointed to the
keg of powder.

"My powder! What was he going to do with that?"

"Blow us all sky-high."

"And you saw him?"

"Yes, I caught him in the act of lighting the fuse lying there."

"But how came you to be up?"

"I was restless,--thinking about the keg and other things."

"It must have been an act of Providence," murmured Amos Radbury. "Who
fired the shot?"

"Poke Stover. He has gone after Stiger," concluded Dan.

All ran out of the cabin, and found the frontiersman and the half-breed
at the edge of the clearing. Hank Stiger had been struck in the knee
and was evidently suffering great pain, for after screaming for awhile
he fell back in a dead faint.

Stover and Pompey were for leaving him where he had fallen, but neither
Amos Radbury nor his sons had the heart to do this, and in the end the
half-breed was carried to the cattle shed and put in the corner from
whence he had removed the powder. All were anxious to question him
about his actions, but the wounded man was in no condition to ta