“Darley, you stand here on the sidewalk, and watch the roof-top across the street,” Dave ordered.  “Hemingway, you get over on the other side and keep your eyes on the roof on this side of the street.  If you see any one on a rooftop, let him have it as fast as you can fire.”

Dan Dalzell, seeing that manoeuvre from across the street, stationed two roof-watchers similarly on his side.

“We’ll stick to this sharpshooting stunt,” Lieutenant Trent called in Darrin’s ear, over the crackling of the rifles, “until we get a few of the Mexicans ahead.  Then we’ll rush their position and try to drive them from it.  The only way-----”

That was as far as Lieutenant Trent got, for Dave, making a sudden leap at his superior, seized him by the collar, jerking him backward a few feet and landing him on his back.

“What the-----” sputtered Lieutenant Trent.   That was as far as
he got, for there was a crash, the sidewalk shook, and then Darrin
quickly pulled his superior to his feet.

The report of Hemingway’s rifle was not heard, but a tiny cloud of thin vapor curled from the muzzle of his uplifted weapon.

“I think I got one of the pair, sir!” called the sailor, gleefully.  “He threw up his hands and pitched backward out of sight.”

Lieutenant Trent looked at the sidewalk astounded, for, where he had stood hay the broken pieces of a cookstove that had been hurled from the roof two stories above.

“That mass of iron fell right where I was standing,” muttered Trent.  “Darrin, I wondered why on earth you should jerk me back and lay me out in that unceremonious fashion.  If you hadn’t done it the cookstove would have crushed my bones to powder.”

“It shows the temper of the kind of people we’re fighting,” muttered Darrin, compressing his lips tightly.  “We’ll soon have the whole city full trying to wipe us out!”

“We may as well rush that building ahead,” muttered the lieutenant.  “I’d rather have my men killed in open fighting than demolished by all the heavy hardware on these two blocks.”

Raising his voice, Trent ordered: 

“Cease firing!  Load magazines and hold your fire.  We’re going to charge!”

From the sailormen a half-suppressed cheer arose.  Hand-to-hand fighting was much more to their liking than tedious sharpshooting.

“Keep close to the building on either side of the street!” Lieutenant Trent ordered.  “No man is to run in the middle of the road and make an unnecessary target of himself.  Ensigns Darrin and Dalzell will run behind their men, to see that no man exposes himself uselessly.”

“Fall in!  Ready to charge.  In single file—–­charge!”

Heading the line on Darrin’s side of the street, Trent dashed around the corner, leading his sailormen at a run.

Dalzell’s men rushed into the fray at the same moment, Dave amid Dan, as ordered, bringing up the rear of the two files.