ropping his revolver, he
drew Bob Scott's knife and backed up against the inner office door,
just as a warrior brandishing a hatchet sprang at him.

CHAPTER XII

Before Bucks had time to think, a second Indian had sprung through the
open window. A feeling of helpless rage swept over him at being
cornered, defenceless; and, expecting every instant to be despatched
with no more consideration than if he had been a rat, he stood at bay,
determined not to be taken alive.

For an instant his mind worked clearly and with the rapidity of
lightning. His life swept before him as if he were a drowning man. In
that horrible moment he even heard his call clicking from the
despatcher. Of the two Indians confronting him, half-naked and shining
with war-paint, one appeared more ferocious than the other, and Bucks
only wondered which would attack first.

He had not long to wait. The first brave raised a war club to brain
him. As Bucks's straining eye followed the movement, the second Indian
struck the club down. Bucks understood nothing from the action. The
quick, guttural words that followed, the sharp dispute, the struggle
of the first savage to evade the second and brain the white boy in
spite of his antagonist--a lithe, active Indian of great strength who
held the enraged warrior back--all of this, Bucks, bewildered, could
understand nothing of. The utmost he could surmise was that the second
warrior, from his dress and manner of authority perhaps a chief, meant
to take him alive for torture. He watched the contest between the two
Indians until with force and threats the chief had driven the warrior
outside and turned again upon him.

It was then that Bucks, desperate, hurled himself knife in hand at the
chief to engage him in final combat. The Indian, though surprised, met
his onset skilfully and before Bucks could realize what had occurred
he had been disarmed and tossed like a child half-way across the
room.

Before he could move, the chief was standing over him. "Stop!" he
exclaimed, catching Bucks's arm in a grip of steel as the latter tried
to drag down his antagonist. "I am Iron Hand. Does a boy fight me?"
he demanded with contempt in every word. "See your knife." He pointed
to the floor. "When I was wounded by the Cheyennes you gave me
venison. You have forgotten; but the Sioux is not like the white
man--Iron Hand does not forget."

A fusillade of shots and a babel of yelling from outside interrupted
his wo