CHAPTER XIXOUT OF THE FRYING PAN——
Before the falling Apache smashed down upon the cliff foot the man who had last climbed the long ladder made an upward rush. He was within half a dozen rungs of the top when a large round object rolled out of the doorway. With the quickness of a puma he swung off to one side.
The big missile grazed past the dodger. Three or four yards farther down it crashed upon the ladder. All the mid section of the wobbly structure was shattered to flinders. The lower part slithered sideways along the cliff face, the upper part and the two climbers plunged downward.
The cliffs rang with the yells of the ladder holders as they leaped away. They bounded like startled deer. But one was struck in the back by the splintered end of a falling ladder pole. He pitched on his face, rolled over, and lay as still as the fallen climbers.
"Four!" exultantly exclaimed Slade. "Four—done up by a keg of water. And the three first"—Lennon had thought them sacks of corn at the footof the ladder—"seven, and Pete with us—leaves less 'n twenty of 'em, counting Cochise. And mebbe Carmena has potted one or two more out in the scrub."
"You'll attack?" asked Lennon.
"Sure. No chance of holding Cochise after him losing them men. The others would turn on him like mad coyotes if he backed up. Just hold your hosses a bit, though, till I tell you."
Lennon impatiently glanced away from his rifle sights. For the first time he saw that the Navahos were no longer alongside him. Pete was creeping aslant the dam toward the cliffs. The three others had circled to the left and were disappearing into the irrigation canal where it curved down valley below the reservoir.
"Got to flush them snakes in the grass," explained Slade. "Pick your mark and wait. I'll start off with this here devil across the tank."
The scattered ladder raisers were bunching again close under the cliff, to one side of the cliff house openings. One of them made signs to the outlying riflemen. The others began to work on the broken ladders. The firing had almost ceased.
Slade moved a few yards along the dam. Lennon drew back his rifle, looked carefully at the lock and magazine, and took up a position from which he couldfire with the greatest rapidity. He had been ready only a few minutes when from the irrigation canal, down the valley behind the Apache riflemen, came the reports of three shots, fired in rapid succession.
A fourth shot roared from Slade's rifle. Lennon began to fire as fast as he could take aim. His mark was the group of Apaches on the cliff foot. One fell and lay motionless. Another tumbled over, but rebounded to join in the dash of his companions down the slope.
The bare ledges of the cliff foot offered no shelter. The nearest cover was the ruined Farley ranch hut, a hundred yards or more away, in the direction of the reservoir. But as the Apaches raced for the refuge first one of their leaders and then another pitched to the ground.
The others swerved and went flying out toward the irrigation canal. A burst of shots from the canal again forced them to swerve. They fled toward a patch of rocks and cactus in the direction of Devil's Chute. Only four reached the cover.
As Lennon had emptied his magazine during the first few seconds, he knew that he could not have shot more than one of the fugitives. The three Navahos had spread out along the canal, and Pete had hidden at the ruined hut. They had the Apaches under firefrom flank and rear. Slade had dodged down to run around the head of the reservoir and leap the inlet canal.
The thwack and screech of a glanced bullet that flicked a spurt of gravel into Lennon's face, warned him that the Navahos were not doing all the firing. Though so many of the Apaches had been killed in the surprise of the counter attack, the survivors of the band still outnumbered the rescuers two or three to one.
Lennon knew enough to creep back under the round of the dam. Once safe below the crest, he sprinted after Slade at top speed. He was under cover until he leaped the inlet canal and skirted along the natural rock rim on the far side of the reservoir.
The problem now was to find a sheltered way from the brink of the rim over and down into the Farleys' kitchen garden. Slade had somehow made the crossing. He was safe in a position of vantage at the goat pens.
Before Lennon could locate the sheltered line of descent he noticed that some of the shots sounded from farther down the valley. His first thought was that more Apaches were coming to join in the fight. Slade's reinforcements from the pueblo could not be expected before late in the day.
For a moment the situation appeared truly desperate. The odds were already heavy enough, without the addition of more Apaches. But a cautious peep over the rock rim disclosed to Lennon the happy truth. Out-manœuvred and cut off from the best cover, the Apaches were beginning to fall back down the valley.
By close scrutiny, Lennon made out a brown form wriggling away behind a clump of cactus that shut off the view of Slade and the Navahos. At the second bullet from the high-power rifle the creeping Apache rolled over. There was no need for a third shot.
After this hit Lennon saw not the slightest sign of the retreating band. But he continued to rake the rocks and cactus clumps with frequent shots, while the Navahos in the ditch followed along the flank of their half-exposed enemies.
Lennon became aware that shots were being fired from the cliff house. Soon afterward he saw Slade rush boldly along the cliff foot. The Apaches were too intent upon flight to fire at the now distant enemies in their rear. One glance at the trader sent Lennon bounding up over the rim of rock and down the slope.
The rope ladder dropped from the cliff house doorway. By the time Lennon reached the tumbledownranch hut Slade was at the top of the ladder and Pete was beginning to climb. Lennon dashed on along the cliff foot. He gave no heed to the dead Apaches that lay huddled or sprawled amidst the wreckage of the wooden ladder poles and rungs. At the foot of the rope ladder he thrust his rifle through the back of his belt and swung up as fast as he could climb.
Before he had ascended twenty feet a half-spent bullet thudded against the cliff face at his elbow. Another grazed his side. At least one of the distant Apaches had turned about and was making uncomfortably close shots at the climber. Lennon stopped short. A bullet struck less than a span above his head. He hurried on up by irregular jerks and dashes.
More bullets struck around him. One seared his thigh. Owing, however, either to sheer good fortune or to his jerky ascent, he reached the top of the ladder without a serious wound.
Pete lay flattened out in the doorway behind a sack of corn. He was firing down the valley. Lennon flung himself in past the young Navaho. Safe within the cliff house, he reeled against the massive wall and stood panting for breath.
From the doorway of the living room came a happy cry. Elsie darted out to fling her arms about Lennon.
"Oh! oh! oh! You did get up, Jack—you did!" she cried. "Mena was dreadfully afraid for you. The 'Paches have killed one of Slade's punchers and are chasing the others back."
Lennon kissed the quivering girl and thrust her from him to grasp his rifle.
"We're safe now, Blossom. But I must help to cover the retreat of our men."
He ran to the crane-hoist opening. Slade was crouched behind a barricade of corn-filled sacks, hotly blazing away down the valley. Lennon hurried on into the living room.
Beside the nearest outer window Farley lay upon a pile of rugs very white and still. His neck and right leg were swathed in bandages. The rifle under the window showed that the broken drunkard had not lacked courage to join in the defense of his home.
Carmena stood at the next window, too intent upon her firing to heed her exposed position. A bullet had grazed the side of her head. At sight of the blood trickling down on her cheek Lennon felt an almost irresistible impulse to run over and draw her out of danger.
But the angle of the girl's rifle barrel told him that the fight was rapidly coming back up the valley. He sprang to Farley's window. As he looked down, thetwo Navahos broke from the last scant cover and came leaping and zigzagging up toward the cliff foot.
Lennon thrust out his rifle and began to pump shots at the scrub and cactus clumps above which rose thin puffs of semi-smokeless powder. A bullet nipped the point of his shoulder. He jumped back to refill his magazine. Before he could again empty it, another bullet seared across the top of his head. He reeled and fell senseless.
When he recovered consciousness he was first aware of the face of Carmena. In his first daze, he fancied that he was out on the far side of the Basin, lying upon the sand under the cliff where the Gila monster had bitten his hand. The girl's eyes were clouded with the same look of profound concern that he had then seen in their shadowy depths.
But as his own gaze cleared he noticed two marked differences in her appearance. One of her pale cheeks was streaked with crimson, and the dark eyes were wide not with dread alone. They gazed down at him heavy with the anguish of mingled grief and yearning. He knew that he was looking into the girl's inmost heart.
A hand was thrust between their faces—a little dimpled hand that held a bowl of red liquid. Elsie's voice quavered urgently:
"Let me fix your hurt with the dragon sap, Mena. He's alive again."
Carmena's long lashes drooped upon her white cheeks. She drew back. Lennon turned aside his violently aching head. Across the living room he saw Pete cauterizing a bullet wound on the bare arm of a fellow Navaho with the astringent red sap of the sangre de dragon tree.
Elsie noticed Lennon's roving look of inquiry.
"They shot the other one on the ladder," she explained. "But Slade isn't hurt, and he hauled the ladder up. Cochise can't get us now."
"Not now," whispered Carmena. "But if Slade——"
Her low-pitched voice broke and hushed to a frightened silence.
Slade swaggered in from the anteroom and stood grinning as if very well satisfied with what he saw.
CHAPTER XXINTO THE FIRE
Carmena rallied and smiled up at the big trader with a show of trustful confidence. "I knew you'd keep your part of the deal, Mr. Slade," she said. "You've fought off Cochise and saved us, and there's a good big hole in his bunch. All we need do now is wait for your punchers to come in and wipe out the rest."
"Sure!" agreed Slade. "I done it. Now I got a dead cinch all 'round."
He drew his revolver and twirled the cylinder as if to make certain that it had been fully reloaded.
"Yep—a dead cinch. With me up here, Cochise won't try no more pole ladders. You and my Cookie Gal better hustle up some feed. Ain't had nothing but bacon and flapjacks since I left."
Elsie fluttered across to light her charcoal brazier. But Carmena lingered beside Lennon.
"Huh," muttered Slade. "Where'd sonny boy git hit? Ain't plunked bad, is he?"
"Oh, no. I——"
"No, not fatal," Carmena broke in on Lennon's disclaimer of serious injury. She gave Slade a significant side glance.
"No, I'm sure it won't prove fatal—just cut the bone a bit. Jack'll get over it all right if he keeps perfectly quiet."
Slade's big face took on a look of solemn concern.
"Quiet—huh? Can't let him take no risks. He's worth ten thousand to me. Here, you, Pete—and you——"
A guttural command in Navaho and a careless wave of the revolver brought Pete and his wounded but still active companion hurrying forward.
Carmena sprang up and held out her arms to the trader. Lennon failed to see her face. He saw only how Slade swept his left arm about the girl and swung her around in a bearlike embrace. Lennon sought to leap up. The Navahos seized him on either side and forced him down again.
He caught a glimpse of Carmena futilely clutching for Slade's throat. The big man burst into a bellow of contemptuous laughter and flung her from him.
"Bah!" he jeered. "What you bucking about? Don't figger I wantyouany more, do you?"
"No—no, of course not. I—— But Jack's head—If you hogtie him——"
"Got to be kept quiet, ain't he? You said it yourself. What you hanging fire for, Pete?"
The heavy revolver swung around in another seemingly careless gesture. Pete and the wounded Navaho hogtied Lennon with expert quickness.
Slade shifted around to nudge Farley in the ribs with the toe of his cowhide boot. The badly wounded man stirred and opened his haggard eyes to blink at the disturber.
"Has—Cochise—— What! you?" he murmured. "You have run off the devils? Girls safe?"
"You bet they're safe, Dad. How you feeling? Looks like they plugged you pretty bad."
"Very—very bad," gasped Farley. "I—do not expect to—survive."
"Aw, keep a stiff upper lip. You'll pull through."
Farley's discoloured eyelids quivered and drooped. Slade had been peering sideways at the rigidly posed Carmena. He laughed good-humouredly, put up his revolver, and grinned toward Elsie.
"I smell grub—real grub. Carmena, you git over to the far window and keep a lookout while I feed up. Just leave your gun lie. We don't want to rile up Cochise till we git him cornered."
The girl looked at Lennon and hesitated. Slade rested his hand on his hip. She hurried off to the window toward which he had pointed.
Seated alone at the table, the trader feasted upon the food set before him by Elsie. While he gormandized he tormented the shrinking girl with his coarse gallantry. When at last his gluttonous appetite was satisfied he called for another pie. Elsie obediently brought the last of her baking and bent over the corner of the table to set it before him.
With the quickness of a striking grizzly, Slade lunged forward and clutched her soft round arm. At her startled shriek he wrenched his massive body half around and menaced everyone in the room with a sweeping wave of his revolver.
Lennon had been bound too tightly to do more than writhe. Pete and his fellow Navaho stood as if turned to stone. But Farley had twisted about on the floor, and Carmena was springing away from her outlook window toward the table. The revolver barrel paused in line with her forward-rushing figure.
"Stop!" bellowed Slade.
The savage roar threatened instant death. Carmena came to a sudden halt. She stood panting and quivering, her face white, her eyes dilated with horror.
"Huh! Thought you'd rush me, did you?" growled the trader. "You didn't stop any too soon to save your bacon, you she-wildcat. Stand still now, or you'll git gentled with a club."
"But—but, Mr. Slade——" gasped the horror-stricken girl. "Blossom—she's only a child. She's so young and—and innocent! Oh, won't you—won't you please take me instead?"
"You?" sneered the trader. "Jealous, are you? Well, you're too late now. Wouldn't take me when you had the chance. Now I wouldn't have you even if I couldn't git her."
"But she—little Blossom! Oh, you can't—you can't be so heartless! You promised to wait——"
"Wait?" Slade jerked the half-fainting Elsie around the corner of the table.
"Ain't I waited all this time? This is same as Injun country, and squaws mate-up young. I'm going to take my Cookie Gal now. Sabe? Injun marriage is good enough 'round these parts for any woman, white or red."
"You—beast!" cried Carmena, and she flung herself at him in a fury of despair.
A few seconds before he would have shot her down. Now, instead of firing, he released his hold on Elsie's arm and thrust out to meet the frantic rush of herfoster-sister. The big red hand clutched fast on Carmena's throat and held her off at arm's length. Contemptuously heedless of her frenzied struggles, he fixed a hard stare on Pete.
"You," he ordered, "git a hustle on. Rope this hellcat, pronto."
Though Pete's hesitancy was almost imperceptible, Slade's revolver swung up toward him. The young Navaho sprang forward, jabbering to his fellow tribesman. As the two seized and started to bind Carmena, Slade grinned at her, derisively.
"Guess you wish you hadn't," he jeered. "I'll learn you who's boss. How'll you like being let down to Cochise, huh?"
The danger to Elsie had horrified and enraged Lennon no less than Carmena. He had been writhing in his rawhide bonds, in a furious struggle to break loose. Now he lay exhausted and hopeless, his wrists and ankles cut and bleeding from the cruelly tight thongs. Even the hideous threat against Carmena could not goad his flaccid muscles to renewed efforts.
Behind him he heard a peculiar wheezing. He twisted his head about to look. Farley was creeping along the floor. As Lennon caught sight of him, the desperately wounded man clutched his rifle and straightened up on his knees. His ghastly face wasblotched with angry purple. His sunken eyes flamed with vengeful fire. He raised the muzzle of the rifle toward Slade with the last flare of his failing strength.
"You scoundrel!" he shrilled. "Harm my daughter, would you?"
Slade's savage bellow was drowned in the crash of the rifle. The bull-like roar of the trader sharpened to a yell of pain. An instant later two answering shots came back at the swaying avenger.
Farley fell upon his back, with his arms outflung crosswise and his glazing eyes upturned. As he lived, so he had died—futilely. Yet he had at least made the attempt to rise above his weakness and degeneracy. He had died like a man.
Slade stood at the end of the table, mopping the base of his neck with his dirty neckerchief. The rifle had missed his jugular vein by little more than an inch. He cauterized the wound with sangre de dragon sap, cursing blasphemously and barking commands at the Navahos.
Pete ran to signal from the nearest window. His companion hurried to make certain that Farley was dead. Slade shouldered past the half-bound Carmena and came to stare gloatingly down at Lennon. Between his thick legs Lennon saw Carmena twist about and roll over toward her terror-stricken sister. Sladewas too intent upon mocking his other prisoner to look about at the girls.
"Well, son, you seen what happened to Dad, trying to murder his pard," he admonished. "Hope it'll be a warning to you. I'm a peaceful man. I got to have law and order. Cochise ripped loose with his bunch. You seen how I smashed his play. 'Fore night my Navahos'll clean up what's left of 'em all."
Lennon choked down his rage and loathing. Not he alone was in the power of this brutal scoundrel. For the sake of the girls he must play for time.
"Yes, to be sure!" he said. "That was clever generalship on your part, Slade. As for Farley—you of course had to shoot him, in self-defense. But now all is settled. You will keep your word to go through with your bargain."
"I will, will I, huh?"
"How else? We have had our little misunderstandings. But you are a white man and you gave your word to go through with our deal."
The trader's face blackened with a ferocious scowl.
"Try to be funny with me, will you? I'll skin you alive!"
"You misunderstood me, quite," said Lennon, soothingly. "How could I think other than that you intend to keep your bargain. I mentioned it because I wishto suggest an addition to the terms. If you will release Carmena and postpone your marriage to Elsie until we can get a license and a minister, I shall be pleased to give five thousand toward the bride's trousseau."
For a long moment Slade stood glowering, morosely suspicious of the proposal. When he sensed its precise meaning, he burst into mocking laughter.
"So that's what you're after, huh? Think you can bribe me, do you? Well, just let me tell you, sonny boy—when I want a squaw I take her. As for that she-wildcat, she's going down to Cochise right now. What's more, you're going with her if you don't agree to write that mine report and shell out the whole twenty thousand."
"You devil!" cried Lennon. "I'll give you all—everything I possess—to save the girls from you. But if you harm either one of them—if you refuse to set them both free—you shall not have a dollar of my money."
"Huh—I sha'n't, sha'n't I?"
"Not a cent! You are a thief, a murderer, a liar—and you know it. Your word is not to be trusted. Take your choice. Kill me, or accept my pledge to pay you the money when you have brought me and the girls safe to the nearest town."
The corner of Slade's coarse lip drew up in a wolfish snarl.
"Kill you? Just wait and see. Killing's a heap too easy. Wait till Cochise has had a little fun with you. Mebbe you won't agree to be reasonable then, huh?"
The pale eyes of the trader glittered with cold malevolence as he swung around to the window from which Pete was signalling. He boldly thrust his head out and shouted to the Apaches in their own tongue. From below came an answering shout. Slade called down to them for several moments in hissing thick-tongued gutturals.
When at last he drew back and faced about, his mouth was twisted in a grin of evil satisfaction. He stared across the room, blinked, and stared again, with his grin distorted into an angry grimace.
Carmena lay where he had last seen her. But Elsie was nowhere in sight.
CHAPTER XXITREACHERY
The inaction of the trader was brief. At his harsh question the wounded Navaho thrust out a slim finger toward one of the rear exits from the living room. Slade spoke a fierce command to Pete in the Navaho tongue and rushed out through the opening to which the Indian had pointed.
Carmena uttered a horrified cry and sought to struggle up on her bound feet. As she fell, Pete and the other Navaho caught hold of her. They carried her out into the anteroom, without paying the slightest heed to Lennon's threats and pleadings. He writhed and twisted himself toward the doorway. Before he had reached the opening, the wounded Navaho bounded back into the room. He seized Lennon and dragged him out.
Pete had squatted down to fasten a loop of the hoist rope about Carmena, who lay behind the sacks of corn that barricaded the crane-hoist entrance. She was speaking rapidly to the young Navaho in mingledSpanish and English. At sight of the other Navaho and Lennon she paused.
Pete took the opportunity to mutter a sullen reply:
"Basta.Slade, him bad med'cine. Me no fight him. You go Cochise,muy pronto."
"Wait!" urged the girl. "You want me to be your woman. Remember what I promised if you'd help Slade to get up the cañon against Cochise. I'll promise more now. I'll give you all those horses and cattle—and I'll give you myself. Sabe? I'll be your woman."
The Indian's eyes gleamed with avid desire. But he did not falter.
"Woman no good, me dead."
"Afraid—you girl!" taunted Carmena. "He's only a man. A single shot will kill him. You have only to——"
"Basta.Him big devil. Me no shoot him. Him say you go Cochise,muy pronto."
The stubborn coward turned away toward the windlass. Carmena glared after him in agonized desperation.
"All right—all right, Pete!" she cried. "Lower me to Cochise. But listen! You needn't fight Slade or any one. You heard how he fooled Cochise—made him feel good by promising him me and Jack?"
"Me send you down, pronto."
"Yes—yes. Only first, if you want me to be your woman, listen. You lower me, I make bargain with Cochise and——"
The rest of the fiercely urgent proposal was in Spanish. Pete came to a pause and cast a stealthy glance at his fellow Navaho. The man had dragged Lennon out past the windlass and turned back to grasp the crank handle.
"You damn sure Cochise him no kill me? You no lie?" demanded Pete.
"Won't you be proving you are his friend?" countered the girl. "You know Slade only half trusts you. He'll be sure to shoot you, soon as his punchers come. How about it? Do you promise? It's your only chance to get me, so long as you daren't tackle Slade yourself."
"Slade, him big devil. Injun no can——"
"Just wait and see," broke in Carmena. "Remember, there'll be tizwin for you—all you can drink—heaps of tizwin!"
"Ugh!" grunted Pete. "Slade no come.Bueno—me do him you say."
He grunted to the other Navaho and swung the crane outward as the tightening rope lifted the girl above the sacks of corn. She disappeared from view below the barrier. The Navaho lowered away witha deliberation that set Lennon's teeth on edge. The strain on his nerves was not lessened by the total silence of the waiting Apaches down below.
At last the rope slackened. After a brief pause it was rapidly wound in on the barrel of the windlass. Pete had already dragged Lennon to the opening and heaved him up on the barricade. When the rope loop came up to the crane, he jerked it in, made fast to Lennon, and shoved him off into space.
Lennon plunged down nearly a dozen feet before the tautened rope stopped his fall with a violent jerk. He hung dangling, with nothing between him and the wreckage-strewn ledges of the cliff foot, thirty feet beneath.
The first jerk had started his body to gyrating. The rapidity with which he was lowered increased the movement. By the time he reached the cliff foot he was spinning like a roast before an old-time fireplace.
At first he had been able to make out Carmena standing in the midst of a close group of Apaches. But she and the Indians and the cliff wall had all merged into a blurred whirl before his dizzy eyes by the time he struck the cliff foot. With the slackening of the rope he rolled over, too giddy even to attempt to steady himself with his bound hands.
While his eyes were yet too dazed for clear vision, heheard Carmena's voice, low-pitched and vibrant with passionate pleading:
"... And him too, Cochise. I'm not asking you to give up your fun with him. Only wait till you've made sure of Slade. There's not a second to lose. You have us. We can't get away. But if you don't do what I ask, you won't get Slade. He'll be up there—safe—with your woman! And his Navahos will trap you here in the Hole."
"You lie!" grunted the young Apache. "Slade send you down to git his noose on me. I haul up pony lift—hit out Hell Cañon—take you and white fool. Heap fun with you and him!"
"What then?" queried Carmena. "You know you'll have Slade on your trail—Slade and a posse and the soldiers. Slade will have to wipe you out to cover up what we've been doing here. He'll lay it all on you and your bunch—all the stealing. Can't you see? If he can't wipe you out himself, he'll set the soldiers on your trail."
Lennon looked up and saw before his clearing eyes the dark evilly handsome face of the Apache leader. It was as stolid as the faces of his incomprehending followers. But his black eyes were fierce with hate.
"You lie!" he repeated. "You say, kill Slade. You say you no care what become of you."
"Because I know you, Cochise," cajoled the girl, her voice soft and confiding. "Weren't we friends before Slade came? Weren't we good to you? Remember how we kept you hid in the Hole and never told the Indian Agent? You'll not forget that. You'll treat me and Jack, my new pard, all right when I've helped you kill Slade."
"Dam' friend—you," jeered the Indian. "You kept my woman."
"What if I did? How about now? Do you want Slade to have her? You know he has been scheming all along to take her from you. Are you going to let him do it? Think about her—and about the tizwin—that tizwin hidden from you by Slade—barrels of tizwin! All yours if only you have the nerve to go up after Slade!"
Cochise looked up the cliff, with a sudden ferocious scowl. Lennon was gasping for breath against the frightfulness of what he had heard. To save herself, Carmena was betraying her foster-sister to the fiendish savage. Elsie's fate in the hands of Slade was fearful enough without the added horror of what she would suffer in the hands of Cochise.
"Carmena!" he cried. "Carmena, are you mad? Think of Blossom! What does it matter if we are tortured? Surely you can't intend——"
"Why not?" cried back the girl, her face aflame with vengeful anger. "That big beast first ruined my father; now he has murdered him. Cochise, you'll have to choose quickly. Run off with us and have your fun, and have Slade trail you down; or kill him and get your woman and the tizwin—barrels of tizwin!"
The young Apache plucked out his knife and sprang at the girl. A stroke slashed through the thongs that bound her wrists. Her ankles had already been freed. Cochise made a sharp upward gesture. Carmena shook her head and pointed to Lennon.
"Let him lead the way up—unarmed," she suggested.
The advantage of the plan was instantly grasped by the crafty Apache. At his command, two of his men cut loose Lennon's bonds and jerked him to his feet.
"Wait, Carmena! Wait!" begged Lennon. "Think of Elsie!"
But the girl had already signalled to those above. The rope ladder came slipping down the cliff face. Lennon fell silent. Protests were now useless. The lowering of the ladder laid the cliff stronghold open to the merciless Apaches.
He turned away from the girl, full of loathing. Slade might possibly have refrained at the last moment from wronging Elsie. But Cochise——
There was no need of the Apache's prodding knife point to start him up the ladder. Though he did not relish having to act as a living shield for the attackers, he was more than willing to go first. Unluckily the tightness of his bonds had so bruised the ligaments of his wrists and ankles and left his limbs so numb that he had to climb with painful slowness.
Cochise, following at his heels, cursed and jabbed his knife into Lennon's leg. The cruel goading stung the benumbed muscles to quicker action. Lennon sprinted up the ladder, clear of his torturer. A glance down the rungs showed him three Apaches below Cochise, and Carmena at the foot, waiting with the remainder of the band. The ladder would not safely bear more than five climbers at a time.
Spurred even more by the plan that he had in mind than by the threat of the knife, Lennon sought to increase his lead over Cochise. But the Indian's wrists were not strained, and his flexible moccasins gave a better hold on the ladder rungs than Lennon's stiff boot soles. With the knife between his teeth, the young Apache swung up in swift pursuit.
Instead of gaining, Lennon lost his lead. Another downward glance, as he grasped the last rung below the sill of the cliff house doorway, showed him that Cochise was again at his heels. He must change thetactics of his plan. He uttered a startled cry and pretended to slip down a rung.
Cochise let go the ladder with one hand to jab his knife at Lennon's leg. Lennon jerked up the leg and kicked down with all his strength. The heel of his boot struck squarely in the upturned face of the Apache. The downward and outward force of the blow jerked loose Cochise's one-handed grip on the ladder. But even as he toppled backward, he crooked a leg with catlike quickness over one of the rungs.
Lennon saw only that his enemy was falling. His hand had already groped over the edge of the sill. Without another downward glance, he flung himself up and into the doorway. The wild scramble and plunge all but drove him headlong over the sack of corn and against the menacing muzzle of Pete's rifle.
That double traitor stood crouched at the inner side of the thick-walled entrance, torn between fear of Cochise and terror of Slade. Lennon had counted upon this dread and uncertainty of the young Navaho. He flung out his hands to him in urgent gestures.
"Quick—quick!" he cried. "Cut loose the ladder! Cochise will kill you! He's coming! Cut the ladder!"
The Indian shrank back to peer at the inner openings of the cliff house.
"Carmena—him no lie," he muttered. "Cochise kill 'um Slade."
"But you first!" urged Lennon. "He will——"
The band of an Apache headress shot up above the edge of the door sill. Lennon sprang at Pete to clutch his knife. The Navaho flung up his rifle. A chance blow of the barrel sent Lennon staggering half across the anteroom.
The Apache writhed up into the doorway and bounded over the sack of corn, his knife poised to strike. Pete whirled and fired from the hip. An instant later he was locked in the clutch of the yelling, slashing Apache. As they crashed down together in a furious death grapple, a second Apache came scrambling in over the cliff edge. Side by side with him appeared Cochise, the print of Lennon's boot-heel already blackening on his ferociously scowling forehead.
Pete's rifle had fallen outward into the doorway, alongside the sack of corn. Lennon was unarmed. There was no time for him to wrest the knife from the wounded Apache and slash the ladder ropes. Cochise clutched Pete's rifle and started to swing it around. His companion thrust out a revolver.
The shot missed Lennon by inches as he leaped to the side opposite the living room. He dashed outthe first opening and started to run through the front row of rooms, shouting at the top of his voice.
"Slade! Slade!" he yelled. "Cochise—Apaches! Defend yourself!"
From the inner rooms on his right came back an angry bellow. "What the devil?"
Lennon twisted aside through a black doorway. Farther in he saw a glimmer of light. Sharp turns through two more doorways brought him into a kiva, or sacred chamber of the cliff dwellers, that was lighted by a pair of candles. Slade stood beside the broken-edged entrance hole with drawn revolver. The wounded Navaho was peering down from a hole in the ceiling.
"Elsie!" panted Lennon. "Hide her! Pete betrayed you! All the Apaches—coming up the ladder!"
Slade sprang sideways along the figure-decorated wall of the kiva. He leaped to grasp the edge of the ceiling hole. The Navaho helped him draw up into the dark room above. As his feet swung clear Lennon leaped in turn to grasp the edge of the hole.
"Give me a hand up," he called. "I'll help you defend Elsie."
"Sure. You'll serve for wolf bait," jeered Slade.
His big hand thrust down and tapped the butt of the heavy revolver on the top of Lennon's head.
CHAPTER XXIITHE SACRIFICE
The treacherous blow was just hard enough to stun Lennon. His unconsciousness probably lasted only a few seconds. He roused to the sound of heavy firing and the pungent odour of powder. He opened his eyes.
One of the candles had been extinguished. The other showed one wounded and two dead Apaches lying upon the floor of the kiva. At the entrance other attackers were stealthily thrusting in to fire at the hole in the ceiling. The flash of answering shots spewed out of the black space above the hole.
Lennon had enough presence of mind to lie still. Dislodged by the fusillade of bullets, the dry materials of the ancient ceiling showered upon him. In the room above he heard the shriek of a mortally struck man. Another fusillade followed. Then a revolver came whirling down out of the darkness.
The Apaches yelled and burst into the kiva. They rushed toward the hole, firing upward as fast as they could pump their magazines. Unnoticed in the excitement,Lennon rolled clear of their trampling feet and sought to grasp Slade's fallen revolver. A chance kick sent it out of his reach.
Wild with blood-thirst, the last Apaches were trying to climb up the backs of those who had first leaped to seize the edge of the ceiling hole. Under the strain of their jerking weight one of the ancient beams gave way.
Down crashed a part of the floor above. With it came Slade, bellowing with rage, bleeding from several wounds, and his right arm shattered. His massive body fell upon and knocked down two of the crowding Apaches. He staggered up and struck out with his maul-like fist.
The voice of Cochise sounded above the din of the fight. The Apaches flung themselves at Slade like wolves attacking a maimed bull. But they used neither rifles nor knives. The trader was borne down by the weight of numbers and his left arm lashed fast to his backward twisted feet.
Cochise had caught up the flickering candle. He sprang upon the back of another man and peered into the room above. When at last he jumped down his face was distorted with anger. He shook his knife in Slade's face.
"Where you hide my woman?" he demanded.
"She hid herself," growled Slade. "I was still looking for her."
"Big mouth—big lie!" scoffed Cochise, and he thrust the flame of the candle against Slade's nose.
The trader puffed out the light. Lennon had been edging around toward the door. He took instant advantage of the darkness to slip out and run toward the living room. There he might hope to find a rifle and die fighting.
In the anteroom he came face to face with a pair of Apaches, who stood on guard over Carmena. At their gestures, emphasized by half-raised rifles, he backed into the corner beside the girl. She flashed him a look of profound relief and put a tremulous hand on his arm.
"Jack—I thought they'd killed you. Slade?"
"Prisoner, like ourselves. But they've still to find Elsie—no thanks to you!"
He drew away as if her touch were a pollution. She flushed, hesitated, and opened her lips to speak. With a burst of yells, the Apaches rushed in, dragging Slade in their midst.
At sight of Lennon, Cochise wrinkled his bruised forehead in a scowl of evil satisfaction. But when he swaggered forward he looked only at Carmena.
"Slade swear you hide my woman," he said.
"How could I?" replied Carmena. "He had me tied up and lowered to you. He was up here with her all that time."
The face of the young Apache became impassive. He turned about and spoke softly to Slade. The trader, half dead from his wounds, raised his big head to mumble a denial.
At a word from Cochise, one of his men ran to fetch Elsie's brazier from the living room. In the bottom of the brazier was still a bed of glowing coals. The Apaches cut free one of Slade's feet and started to thrust it in upon the fire.
Carmena flung up her hands before her eyes.
"No!—no, Cochise!" she cried. "Kill him—he deserves to be killed! But not the torture—I can't bear it! I'll try to find Elsie for you. I think I know where she's hidden."
Lennon stared, more than ever filled with horror of her treachery.
"You—you!" he grasped. "That child—give her, to save that scoundrel?"
"And ourselves," added Carmena, her lips curved in a cajoling smile at Cochise. "When I've found her—and the tizwin—we'll be friends. Won't we, Cochise?"
"Sure. Dam' good friends," smoothly agreed theApache. "You find my woman quick, I let you go. Sabe?"
"Andthe tizwin—the barrels of tizwin," added Carmena. "Come on, all of us together—— You, too, Jack."
She signed to the Apaches and called out a few words in their own thick guttural tongue.
Lennon did not hang back. Great as was his abhorrence of the girl, he started forward beside her. Probably owing to his ready advance, he was not again bound, though Cochise ordered a pair of his followers to guard the white man. The other Apaches pressed close after the leaders, drawn by their fierce craving for tizwin.
Regardless of Lennon's look of loathing, Carmena lighted a candle and led the way direct to the mummy room. From a ceiling beam of the room had been hung a crudely stuffed horned owl with wide-spread wings. At sight of the big gray-white bird and of the mummies even Cochise advanced less than a step inside the entrance.
Carmena went in with the candle and methodically peered among and behind all the heaps of rubbish. When she came back to the entrance her dark brows were drawn together in a frown, as if she were puzzled and trying to think of another hiding place. She looked at Lennon with a level glance.
"Hereafter you will recall that the quick and the dead are associated," she murmured.
She faced about to the superstitious Apaches.
"You see, Cochise. Your woman doesn't like these old dried spirits any more than you do. Come on."
Cochise and his men drew back before her advancing candle. They had no fancy to be left in the darkness with the bird of night and the "dried spirits" of the ancient cliff dwellers. They were not so backward, however, in the other inner rooms to which Carmena led them. Where there was a ceiling hole, one or more readily mounted with the candle to search the space above.
But nowhere was trace found of Elsie, though the candle had burned to a stub when the searchers reached the last inner room. They came from it into a front room, one exit of which was closed with a padlocked door of heavy planks. Lennon recognized the entrance to the still-room.
Carmena handed a key to Cochise and stood shielding the flickering flame of the candle.
"Maybe we'll find both together," she said. "It would have been just like Slade to lock your woman in with the tizwin."
She added a guttural murmur in Apache. The Indians pushed forward as their leader snapped openthe padlock. The heavy door swung open. All surged into the still-room except one of Lennon's guards, and he craned his neck to gape at the still. Into Lennon's ear breathed a faint whisper: "Keep back."
A moment later Carmena was darting in after the Apaches. She took her shielding hand away from the candle to point at a pile of jugs behind the still. With the gesture she called out in Apache. Cochise and all the others rushed to dig into the pile of jugs. Carmena glided to the still and bent down. She thrust the candle into the opening of the firebox.
For the first time Lennon grasped what the girl was about. And with that he realized in a flash all the cool courage and cleverness and self-sacrifice of the plan that she had schemed out against the brute force of Slade and the cruel cunning of Cochise. Elsie was safe hidden in the mummy room, Slade was dying or dead, and now she had lured Cochise and his murderous followers into the death trap!
He saw the flare of the lighted tinder in the firebox. The fuse must already be burning. Yet the girl remained stooped before the still. She would be blown to pieces no less certainly than the Apaches.
Lennon glanced desperately at his guard, who stood beside him in the doorway. The almost naked Apachewas a mass of sinewy muscle, and his beady eyes were fixed upon the prisoner in alert watchfulness. Yet he was not quick enough to dodge Lennon's uppercut. He sprawled backward and struck his shock head upon the stone floor.
Carmena had straightened and faced about. At sight of Lennon bounding toward her she thrust out her hands in a repellant gesture.
He clutched her outflung hands and dragged her toward the door. From behind the still came an answering yell. Cochise and another Apache rushed around at the couple. Carmena lunged forward, to thrust Lennon at the doorway. Unbalanced by the shove, he stumbled over the Apache whom he had knocked senseless.
Carmena fell, rolled to one side, and struggled to her knees as Cochise leaped to the doorway after Lennon. Behind them roared a deafening detonation.
Though Lennon was out in the anteroom, he was hurled down by the force of the explosion. He staggered to his feet and faced about. In the thick of the smoke that spumed from the still-room Cochise bounded from the floor and came at him with upraised knife. Lennon barely saved himself by the quickest of side-stepping.
Cochise shot past, whirled, and closed in with thefury of a wildcat. Lennon's parry of the knife stab was sheer luck, but not the blow that he drove to the solar plexus. Superb as was the physical condition of the young Apache, that solid jolt sent him reeling back, gasping for breath.
Lennon closed and sought to wrest away the knife. He twisted down on the Apache's wrist. The knife fell to the floor. He bent to grasp it. Cochise dropped upon him and seized his throat. The slender sinewy hands tightened with frightful force. A few seconds of that throttling pressure would have brought unconsciousness to Lennon. In vain he sought to tear loose the strangle hold.
He was on the verge of frantic flurry when his failing reason fixed upon the fact that there was a lump under his down-pressed back. By great effort he wrenched his body around. His groping hand grasped the fallen knife.
At the second stroke the terrible clutch on his throat relaxed. Cochise twisted convulsively and rolled over on his back.
Lennon wheezed, felt his throat, and jerked himself over, ready to drive the knife into the heart of his merciless enemy. Cochise lay inert, his mouth agape and his eyes rolled up so that only the whites could be seen. Lennon's deep-drawn sigh of satisfaction overthat death-mask face caught in the midst and turned into a gasp. He flung himself about to the doorway of the still-room. Where the still had stood was now only a hole in the stone floor. He did not look too closely at the general wreckage.
His half-dazed roving gaze fell upon Carmena. She lay as inert as Cochise and the Apache guard. Yet she was not dead. A fragment of stone or metal, or the shock of the explosion, had injured her back.
He carried her out into the anteroom. She revived. But when she sought to rise, she sank back with an ominous limpness.
"Carmena!" he cried. "Carmena—what is it? You're hurt!"
She smiled up at him, her dark eyes radiant with infinite tenderness and devotion.
"It's all right, Jack—all right," she murmured. "I wanted to do it—for Blossom—and you, dear. Now you are safe. The way up the cañon is clear. Take the right fork, then, each time, the left of the next forks. The trail is only a few miles west, over the mesas. You'll find Blossom in the mummy room. Hurry off with her before Slade's men come. Hurry—don't linger——"
"You——" broke in Lennon. "Can you think I would leave you here?"
"There's no other way. My back—I can't sit up, and my legs are numb. I can't move them."
"I'll carry you, and there's the hoist rope."
"No use. I couldn't ride."
"I'll carry you," repeated Lennon.
The girl laid a gently caressing hand on his arm.
"Don't you understand, dear? My back—it must be broken. We must think of Blossom. You must hurry off with her while there is time. Isn't it good that you love her?"
Lennon uttered a choking cry and caught the girl up in his arms. He clasped her to him in an agony of love and remorse.
"Carmena! To have thought so wrong of you—of you who were giving your life! I've been a fool—a blind fool. Forgive me! That child—— My God! I can't give you up—I'llnotgive you up!"
"Then—you do—love me, Jack," sighed the girl. Her arms crept up about his neck. "You do love me—I'm glad now you did not let me die—at once—in there."
"Not at all!" vowed Lennon. "Even though your back—— You'll not die."
"I can't live—like this, dear. And there's Blossom. You must get her away before Slade's men—— But first find me my little pistol. I gave it to Blossom—touse if there was no other way left. Leave it with me, and hurry off with her while there's time. Hurry!"
Lennon's clasp tightened.
"No. I'll never leave you—never while——"
From the inner rooms of the cliff house came a burst of piercing childish shrieks. Carmena twisted about in Lennon's suddenly loosened embrace. There was a sound like the snap of a dry twig. Carmena screamed and fell over sideways in a deathlike faint.