The Round-Up | Page 7

the rock, as if the Indian had stretched himself
involuntarily. CRACK! again, and Lane had got his man.
"Two shots to an Indian is expensive," thought the prospector,
"otherwise this game of tip-jack would be very interesting."
There was a cry in the Apache tongue, and suddenly nine half-naked
bodies arose from behind rocks and bushes extending in an irregular
crescent above the fort, and rushed forward ten, fifteen, and even
twenty, yards to the next cover. Lane did not count number or distance
at the time, but he figured these out in his next period of waiting from
the photograph flashed on his subconscious mind. At the time of the
rush he was otherwise occupied. CRACK! CRACK! and two of the
Indians fell dead in mid-career. CRACK! and a third crawled, wounded,
to the cover he had almost safely attained. CRACK! and an

eagle-feather in the head of the fourth Indian shot at was cut off at the
stem, and fell forward on the rock behind which its wearer had dropped
just in time to save his life. There was an answering volley from the
rifles of the remaining Apaches, which was directed against the lookout
of loose stones from which the prospector's fire had come. One of the
bullets penetrated the opening and plowed a furrow through Lane's
scalp, toppling him to his knees. He scrambled quickly to his feet, and,
hastily pressing his long hair back from his forehead, to stanch the
bleeding wound, sought the protection the middle lookout. He
congratulated himself.
"Lucky for me they didn't follow the first rush immediately with a
second. Now I know to wait for their signal. Six, and possibly seven of
them, are left, and they will storm my works in two more attempts.
Here they come!"
The call again sounded. Six Apaches leaped forward, and from the rock
that concealed the wounded warrior, a shot rang out in advance of the
first discharge from Lane's Winchester. The Indian's bullet scored the
top of the turret, and filled the eyes of the man behind it with powdered
stone. The prospector, already dazed by his wound, fired wildly, and
missed his mark. Quickly recovering himself, he fired again and again,
severely wounding two Apaches. These lay clawing the ground within
twenty yards of the wall. The four remaining Indians were safely
concealed at the same distance, protected no less by the fortification
than by the loose boulders behind which they crouched for the final
spring. Lane realized the fact that his next shots, to be effective, must
be at a downward angle, and to fire them he must expose himself.
"This is my finish," he thought to himself. "Better be killed instantly
than tortured. I hope all four will hit me. Good-by, Jinny"--CRACK!
went his rifle. "Good-by, Nance"--CRACK! again.
At the two shots, surmising that the prospector had shot himself and his
horse, the Apaches did not wait for the signal, but sprang forward and
climbed upon the wall before Lane had had time to mount it. Two of
them he shot as they leaped down within the enclosure. As he reversed
his Winchester to kill himself with the last cartridge, he noted that the

two remaining Apaches had dropped their rifles and were leaping upon
him to take him alive.
He brought his clubbed weapon down upon the head of one of them,
crushing his skull. At the same instant Lane was borne to the ground by
the other Apache, who, seizing him by the throat, began throttling him
into insensibility. In desperation, Lane bethought himself of the cliff,
and, by a mighty effort, whirled over upon his captor toward the
precipice. The ground sloped slightly in that direction, and the
combatants rolled over and over to the very edge of the cliff, where the
Indian, for the first time realizing that the prospector's purpose was to
hurl both of them to destruction, loosened his hold upon the
prospector's throat that he might use his hands to brace himself against
the otherwise inevitable plunge into the valley below. In an instant
Lane's hands were at the Indian's throat, and in another turn he was
uppermost, and kneeling upon his foe at the very verge of the precipice.
Both combatants were now thoroughly exhausted. Lane concentrated
all his remaining strength in throttling the savage. But, just as the tense
form beneath him grew lax with evident unconsciousness, and head fell
limply back, extending over the edge of cliff, his own head was jerked
violently backward by a noose cast around his lacerated neck.
When Lane recovered consciousness he found himself lying on his
back, bound hand and foot by a lariat, and looking up into a grinning
face that he recognized.
"Buck McKee!" he gasped. "This is certainly white of you considering