The buckskin gave a mighty leap that caught Shorty unawares and sent him into a crumpled heap in the sand.  Dade’s riata, tight as a fiddle-string at first, slackened as the buckskin, his breath coming in snorts, surged alongside.  Jack leaned again—­this time to snatch the ivory-handled revolver from the holster on Dade’s saddle.  As well as he could with his legs held rigid by the rope that tied his ankles, he twisted in the saddle and sent leaden answer to the spiteful barking of the guns that called upon them to halt.

[Illustration:  He twisted in the saddle and sent leaden answer to the spiteful barking of the guns.]

Davis he shot, and saw him sway and fall flat, with a smoking gun in his hand.  Another crumpled forward; and Shorty, just getting painfully upon his feet, he sent into the sand again to stay; for his skill with small arms was something uncanny to witness, and his temper was up and turning him into a savage like the rest.

But the range was rapidly growing to rifle-length, and death fell short of his enemies after Shorty went down.  When he saw his fourth bullet kick up a harmless little geyser of sand two rods in advance of the agitated crowd, he left off and turned to his friend.

“I thought you were drunk,” he observed inanely, as is common to men who have just come through situations for which no words have been coined.

“You ain’t the only one who made that mistake,” Dade retorted grimly, and looked back.  “Good thing those hombres are afoot.  We’ll get on a little farther and then we’ll fix a hackamore so you can do your own riding,”

“I can’t stand it to ride any farther—­”

“Are you shot?” Dade pulled in a little and looked anxiously into his face.

“It’s the rope.  They tied it so tight it’s torture.  I’d never have believed it could hurt so—­but they gave me an extra twist or two to show their friendship, I reckon.”

Dade rode on beyond a little, wooded knoll before he stopped, lest the crowd, seeing them halt, might think it worth while to follow them afoot.

“They surely didn’t intend you to fall off,” he said whimsically, when his knife released the strain.  But his lips tightened at the outrage; and his eyes, bent upon Jack’s left ankle, wore the look of one who could kill without pity.

“They’ll never do it to another man,” declared Jack, with vindictive relish.  “It was Davis and the Captain; I killed ’em both.”  He rolled stiffly from the saddle, found his feet like dead things and stumbled to a little hillock, where he sat down.

Dade, kneeling awkwardly in his heavy, bearskin chaparejos, picked at the bonds with the point of his knife.  “Lucky you had on boots,” he remarked.  “Even as it is, you’re likely to carry creases for a while.  How the deuce did you manage to get into this particular scrape?—­if I might ask!”

“I didn’t get into it.  This particular scrape got me.  Say, it’s lucky you happened along just when you did.”