Crash!  The door was burst from its fastenings.

Girty leaped up with startled yell, drawing his knife as he rose.  It had not time to descend before Joe’s second spring, more fierce even than the other, carried him directly on top of the renegade.  As the two went down Joe caught the villain’s wrist with a grip that literally cracked the bones.  The knife fell and rolled away from the struggling men.  For an instant they tumbled about on the floor, clasped in a crushing embrace.  The renegade was strong, supple, slippery as an eel.  Twice he wriggled from his foe.  Gnashing his teeth, he fought like a hyena.  He was fighting for life—­life, which is never so dear as to a coward and a murderer.  Doom glared from Joe’s big eyes, and scream after scream issued from the renegade’s white lips.

Terrible was this struggle, but brief.  Joe seemingly had the strength of ten men.  Twice he pulled Girty down as a wolf drags a deer.  He dashed him against the wall, throwing him nearing and nearer the knife.  Once within reach of the blade Joe struck the renegade a severe blow on the temple and the villain’s wrestling became weaker.  Planting his heavy knee on Girty’s breast, Joe reached for the knife, and swung it high.  Exultantly he cried, mad with lust for the brute’s blood.

But the slight delay saved Girty’s life.

The knife was knocked from Joe’s hand and he leaped erect to find himself confronted by Silvertip.  The chief held a tomahawk with which he had struck the weapon from the young man’s grasp, and, to judge from his burning eyes and malignant smile, he meant to brain the now defenseless paleface.

In a single fleeting instant Joe saw that Girty was helpless for the moment, that Silvertip was confident of his revenge, and that the situation called for Wetzel’s characteristic advice, “act like lightnin’.”

Swifter than the thought was the leap he made past Silvertip.  It carried him to a wooden bar which lay on the floor.  Escape was easy, for the door was before him and the Shawnee behind, but Joe did not flee!  He seized the bar and rushed at the Indian.  Then began a duel in which the savage’s quickness and cunning matched the white man’s strength and fury.  Silvertip dodged the vicious swings Joe aimed at him; he parried many blows, any one of which would have crushed his skull.  Nimble as a cat, he avoided every rush, while his dark eyes watched for an opening.  He fought wholly on the defensive, craftily reserving his strength until his opponent should tire.

At last, catching the bar on his hatchet, he broke the force of the blow, and then, with agile movement, dropped to the ground and grappled Joe’s legs.  Long before this he had drawn his knife, and now he used it, plunging the blade into the young man’s side.

Cunning and successful as was the savage’s ruse, it failed signally, for to get hold of the Shawnee was all Joe wanted.  Feeling the sharp pain as they fell together, he reached his hand behind him and caught Silvertip’s wrist.  Exerting all his power, he wrenched the Indian’s arm so that it was not only dislocated, but the bones cracked.