, his revolver now levelled at Lum.

The warning came too late.

Lum Bangs, in a sudden impulse of rage, pulled the trigger and fired
point blank at Lieutenant Wingate, but the young mountaineer's warning
to him, at the critical moment, had drawn Lum's thoughts from his aim,
and his bullet missed its mark. Hippy heard it whistle past him close to
his head.

_Bang!_

Barely a second had elapsed between Lum Bangs' shot and a second report.

Lum uttered a howl, and his weapon dropped from his relaxed fingers,
just as Hippy sprang upon him and dealt the mountaineer a blow that
felled him.

"Don't! Don't, Hippy! The man has been shot," begged Anne.

"Jump on him! Stomp on him, why don't ye?" screamed a mountain girl.

The room was in instant uproar, and weapons were drawn and levelled
menacingly at the young mountaineer who had ordered Lum to "drop" his
gun.

"Stop!" cried Emma Dean excitedly. "This man didn't fire that second
shot. He has done nothing, so put away your cannon."

"That's right, folks. Ah didn't shoot, but Ah was goin' t'. Some other
duffer fired the shot that hit Lum. You-all kin look at mah gun." He
held it out with the muzzle toward him.

The men crowded about him, examining the cylinder to see if a cartridge
had been fired from it, and taking a sniff at the muzzle.

"That's right. It ain't been fired," agreed a mountaineer, a puzzled
expression appearing on his face. "Did Lum get his'n?"

"No. The bullet went through his wrist," answered Lieutenant Wingate,
who, having turned up the sleeve of Bangs' coat, was peering at the
wounded wrist. "Men, I'm sorry I struck him, but you see I didn't know
some one was going to shoot him. I had to punch him to save my own
life, expecting that he would shoot again. As it was I nearly ran into
that second shot. Fetch me something--some water."

A glass of lemonade was brought, and Nora Wingate threw it into the face
of the unconscious mountaineer. In the meantime, Elfreda was giving
first aid to the injured wrist. Lum began to stir about this time, and,
at Elfreda's suggestion, he was carried to a window where he might get
more free air.

The mountaineers were puzzled. They had, by then, examined every
revolver in the room, including those carried by the Overland Riders,
but not one had been fired.

"Ah wants ter know who fired that shot," demanded one of them. "Somebody
did, an' we're goin' to find the critter that did it. I ain't sayin'
that this