The movement was slow and painful, but it was accomplished successfully.  Only a single step more remained to place him where he wanted to be.  That taken, and one bound was all that he needed to make.  Finally, and for the last time during the advance, the right foot ascended from the ground, was poised for a few seconds in the air, and then came down with the same care as before.  But it touched a loose pebble which turned with the lightest imaginable noise.

As quick as a flash the Apache raised his head, looked in front, and then darted his vision from left to right, when his keen eyes detected something crouching behind him.

At the very instant of the discovery, Fred concentrated all his energies in one effort, and bounded forward like a catapult.  The distance was precisely what it should have been, and, as he threw out his hands, he struck the Indian squarely in the back with the whole momentum of the body.  In fact, the daring boy nearly overdid the matter.  He not only came near driving the Apache to the other side of the opening, but he came equally near plunging himself down it.  As it was, the victim, taken completely off his guard, was thrown against the other side, where his wonderful dexterity enabled him to throw out his hands and check his downward descent.

Fred, after his narrow escape from going down into the cave, scrambled back to his place, and saw the Indian struggling upon the opposite side, with a good prospect of saving himself.  “That won’t do,” was his thought, as he ran round the opening so as to bring himself directly before him.  “I don’t want you up here.”

Thrusting his pistol almost against his painted forehead, he fairly shouted: 

“Get down—­let go, or I’ll shoot!”

Whether the Apache possessed much knowledge of the English tongue can only be conjectured, but the gestures accompanying the command were so expressive that he could not fail to take in the whole meaning.  The Indian, no doubt, considered it preferable to drop down into the pit rather than run against the bullet.  At any rate, he released his hold, and down he went.

As he drooped into the gloom he made a clutch at the lasso, doubtless for the purpose of creeping up unawares upon the lad, who, by a strange providence, had so suddenly become his master.  But the Indian, although a pretty good athlete, had not practiced that sort of thing, and he failed altogether, going down to join his comrades much the same as if he had dropped from a balloon.

Fred proved himself equal to the emergency.  The moment he saw that he was relieved from the presence of his enemy, he darted back to the other side of the opening, caught hold of the lasso, and hurriedly drew it up out of reach of those below.

“There! they can’t come crawling up that when I ain’t thinking,” he said, when the end of the thong was in his hand.