Hopalong blinked through another hole as his friend fired and saw the Indian flop down and crawl aimlessly about on hands and knees.  “What’s he doing now, Red?”

“Playing marbles, you chump; an’ here goes for his agate,” replied the man with the Sharps, firing again.  “There!  Gee!” he exclaimed, as a bullet hummed in through the window he had quitted for the moment, and thudded into the wall, making the dry adobe fly.  It had missed him by only a few inches and he now crept along the floor to the rear of the room and shoved his rifle out among the branches of a stunted mesquite which grew before a fissure in the wall.  “You keep away from that windy for a minute, Hoppy,” he warned as he waited.

A terror-stricken lizard flashed out of the fissure and along the wall where the roof had fallen in and flitted into a hole, while a fly buzzed loudly and hovered persistently around Red’s head, to the rage of that individual.  “Ah, ha!” he grunted, lowering the rifle and peering through the smoke.  A yell reached his ears and he forthwith returned to his window, whistling softly.

Evidently Mr. Cassidy’s eyes were better and his temper sweeter, for he hummed “Dixie” and then jumped to “Yankee Doodle,” mixing the two airs with careless impartiality, which was a sign that he was thinking deeply.  “Wonder what ever became of Powers, Red.  Peculiar feller, he was.”

“In jail, I reckon, if drink hasn’t killed him.”

“Yes; I reckon so,” and Mr. Cassidy continued his medley, which prompted his friend quickly to announce his unqualified disapproval.

“You can make more of a mess of them two songs than anybody I ever heard murder ’em! Shut up!”—­and the concert stopped, the vocalist venting his feelings at an Indian, and killing the horse instead.

“Did you get him?” queried Red.

“Nope; but I got his cayuse,” Hopalong replied, shoving a fresh cartridge into the foul, greasy breech of the Sharps.  “An’ here’s where I get him—­got to square up for my eyes some way,” he muttered, firing.  “Missed!  Now what do you think of that!” he exclaimed.

“Better take my Winchester,” suggested Red, in a matter-of-fact way, but he chuckled softly and listened for the reply.

“Aw, you go to the devil!” snapped Mr. Cassidy, firing again.  “Whoop!  Got him that time!”

“Where?” asked his companion, with strong suspicion.

“None of yore business!”

“Aw, darn it!  Who spilled the water?” yelled Red, staring blankly at the overturned canteen.

“Pshaw!  Reckon I did, Red,” apologized his friend ruefully.  “Now of all the cussed luck!”

“Oh, well; we’ve got another, an’ you had to wash out yore eyes.  Lucky we each had one—­Holy smoke! It’s most all gone!  The top is loose!”

Heartfelt profanity filled the room and the two disgusted punchers went sullenly back to their posts.  It was a calamity of no small magnitude, for, while food could be dispensed with for a long time if necessary, going without water was another question.  It was as necessary as cartridges.