“Listen!” whispered Feeny.  “That’s a signal.  Hist! you’ll hear it again presently.”

Grasping their rifles with nervous hands, the five men stood huddling in a little group at the west end of the low, flat building.

Somewhere out on the dark expanse towards the peak a long, low whistle, ending in an abrupt high note, had sounded.  For a moment there was no repetition.  The invisible foe was signalling for reply.  From whom could answer be expected but Moreno?

“Watch the old scoundrel’s window there and this shutter over here,” whispered the sergeant, indicating a board-covered port in the westward wall.  “They’ll try to show a light, perhaps.  Run round into the corral and smash the first man that tries to come out.  I’ll tend to any feller that shows a head hereabouts.”

Harvey turned with his employe and ran with him as far as the other end of the ranch.  Here he entered the low door-way.  The little lamp burned dimly, but two pairs of dark, dilated eyes gleamed eagerly upon him.

“I’m going to close this door now, girlies,” he whispered.  “Lie still.  Do not venture near it or the window, and don’t be frightened.  It looks as though some of the Morales gang were around here hoping to find the paymaster unguarded.  We’ll give them a lesson they’ll never forget, if they attempt to attack him.”

For all answer Ruth Harvey only nestled closer to her sister and clung to her for courage and support.  Paquita, however, became Amazonian at once.

“Is there nothing I can do, Ned?  I can’t bear to lie here listening and taking no part.  Surely I could shoot a pistol well enough.”

“You can help us best and most by lying flat and showing not so much as a finger at the door.  We can tend to them, Fan.  It won’t be long before father and the troop come galloping back.  Don’t show a light now unless we call.”  Then he darted to the bar-room.

“Are they coming?” hailed the clerk, in a hoarse whisper.

“Somebody signalled out on the plain.  It’s probably they.  Look out for Moreno now; don’t let him or anybody through that door.”

Far out on the desert again, louder, shriller, clearer, the whistle was repeated.

“Ah, blow and be damned to ye!” muttered Feeny.  “There’s no answer from here ye’ll get this night.  Watch out now.  Some of ’em will try to crawl up after a little.”

But nearly five minutes passed without other sign or sound.  Then, closer in, a horse stamped and snorted; a coarse Mexican voice muttered a savage oath.  Feeny, crouching low, darted into the darkness in the direction of the sound.  Plummer and Harvey would have restrained him, but it was too late; he was gone before either could speak.  Then a latch creaked and snapped behind them and, slowly and cautiously, the wooden shutter began to open outward.  In an instant Harvey had raised his rifle and struck the resounding board a fierce blow with the butt.  The door flew back, crashing in violent contact against the grizzled pate of Moreno himself, who, with a howl of mingled rage and anguish, fell back from the aperture.