“Not unless you do,” she said.  “Oh, why don’t you take shelter?”

Immediately he resumed his crouching attitude by her side, and then he turned to her, and there was an unwonted light in his eyes.

“Did you really care as much as that?” he asked.

“You are the stupidest man I know,” she replied, looking away.  “Do you think I’d have stood there if I didn’t!”

There was a great joy in his heart as he took her hand.

“If we get out of this alive, will you say that again?” he asked.

“That you are the stupidest man I know?” she queried, with that perversity inseparable from the daughters of Eve from all time.

“No—­that you care for me?”

And at this she looked into his eyes with a simple earnestness, and said, “Yes.”

What more they might have said was cut short by the furious outburst of firing from the guns, which dropped shell after shell into the projected ambuscade.

And now the British were forcing the natural stronghold of the Indians in many places, and their guards looked as if they were undecided what to do with their prisoners.

“If we don’t collar those chaps,” said Douglas, “they’ll be wanting to account for us before they go off on their own.  They look dangerous.  Stand by me, Jacques, and we’ll crawl up behind them when the next shell comes.  They’re too busily engaged below to pay much attention to us now.”

The words were hardly out of his mouth before their ears caught the eerie sound of a shrapnel shell coming towards them.  The two Indians got down on their faces behind a rock.  The next moment, regardless of consequences, the rancher was on the top of one and Jacques had secured the other.  To take their rifles, and tie their hands and feet with belts, was short work, and then Rory told them that if they remained quiet all would be well with them.  They were sensible redskins, and did as they were bid.

And now it was time for the prisoners to again make their presence known to the British, for should the Indians and breeds succeed in holding the gully beneath them against the invading force, it was tolerably certain they would discover how Pasmore and his companions had overpowered their guards, and swift vengeance was sure to follow.  As they looked down the precipitous sides of the ravine they could see that only four men—­two breeds and two Indians held the narrow pass.  These men, while they themselves were comparatively safe, could easily hold a large number of troops at bay.

“Mon Dieu! it ees ze metis, and it ees mon ami, Leopold St Croix, I can see,” exclaimed Lagrange, as he peered anxiously over the brink.  “Ah!  I tink it ees one leetle rock will keel him mooch dead.”

He did not wait for any one to express assent, but began at once to assist the British with dire effect.  Lagrange never did things by halves.  When he realised that he was compromised with the enemy, he at once started in to annihilate his old friends with the utmost cheerfulness.