Ned threw himself on the floor just in time to avoid a bullet that sang in at the open doorway.  But no other shot was fired then.  The Comanches in silence sank back into the darkness and the rain.  The defenders lay on the floor, guarding the doorways with open rifles.  They could not see much, but they could hear well, and since Ned had given the warning in time every one of the little party felt that they held a fortress.

Ned’s pulses were still leaping, but great pride was in his heart.  It was he, not one of the veterans, who had saved them, and Bowie had instantly spoken words of high approval.  He was now lying flat on the floor, but he looked out once more at the same opening.  There were certainly no projections on the wall now, but he could not tell whether the Comanches were inside it or outside.  If they crept to the sides of the convent’s stone walls the riflemen could not reach them there.  He wondered how many they were and how they had happened to raid so near to San Antonio at this time.

Then ensued a long and trying period of silence.  Less experienced men than the Texans might have thought that the Comanches had gone away after the failure of their attempt at surprise, but these veterans knew better.  Bowie and all of them were trying to divine their point of attack and how to meet it.  For the present, they could do nothing but watch the doorways, and guard themselves against a sudden rush of their dangerous foe.

“Panther,” said Obed White, “it seems to me that you’re getting all the ripping and tearing and chawing that you want on this trip.”

“It ain’t what you might call monotonous,” said the Ring Tailed Panther.  “I agree to that much.”

It had been fully an hour now since Ned had rung the great bell, and they had heard no noises save the usual ones of that night, the wind and the rain.  He surmised at last that the Comanches had taken advantage of the war between the Texans and Mexicans to make a raid on the San Antonio Valley, expecting to gallop in, do their terrible work, and then be away.  Doubtless it had not occurred to them that they would meet such a group as that led by Bowie and the Ring Tailed Panther.

“Ned,” said Bowie, “creep across the floor there to that rope and ring the bell again.  Ring it a long time.  Either it will hurry the Comanches into action, or friends of ours will hear it.  It’s likely that all the Mexicans have now withdrawn into San Antonio, and that only Texans, besides this band of Comanches, are abroad in the valley.”

Ned wormed himself across the floor, and then, pressing himself against the wall, reached up for the rope.  A strange thought darted into his brain.  He had a deep feeling for music, and he could play both the violin and piano.  He could also ring chimes.  He was keyed to the utmost, every pulse and vein surcharged with the emotion that comes from a desperate situation and a great impulse to save it.