the horror of
the night.

"That's the end," said Mac Strann. "Haw-Haw, they wasn't any good in
your prayer."

"I ain't a professional prayin' man," answered Haw-Haw defensively, "but
I done my best. If----" He was cut short by a chorused cry from the
watchers near the door of the barn, and then, through the vomitted smoke
and the fire, leaped the unsaddled body of Satan bearing on his back the
crouched figure of Dan Barry, and in the arms of Barry, limp, his head
hanging down loosely, was the body of the great black dog, Bart.

A fearful picture. The smoke swept following around the black stallion,
and a great tongue of flame licked hungrily after the trio. But the
stallion stood with head erect, and ears flattened, pawing the ground.
With that cloud of destruction blowing him he stood like the charger
which the last survivor might ride through the ruin of the universe in
the Twilight of the Gods.

At the same instant, another smoke-clad figure lunged from the door of
the barn, his hands outstretched as though he felt and fumbled his way
through utter darkness. It was Buck Daniels, and as he cleared the door
the section of tottering wall which he had upheld to keep the way clear
for the Three, wavered, sagged, and then sank in thunder to the floor,
and the whole barn lay a flame-tossed mass of ruin.

The watchers had scattered before the plunge of Satan, but he came to a
sliding halt, as if his rider had borne heavily back upon the reins.
Barry slipped from the stallion's back with the wounded dog, and kneeled
above the limp figure.

"It ain't the end," growled Mac Strann, "that hoss will go runnin' back
into the fire. It ain't hoss nature to keep from goin' mad at the sight
of a fire!"

In answer to him, the black stallion whirled, raised his head high, and,
with flaunting mane and tail, neighed a ringing defiance at the rising
flames. Then he turned back and nuzzled the shoulder of his master, who
was working with swift hands over the body of Black Bart.

"Anyway," snarled Haw-Haw Langley, "the damned wolf is dead."

"I dunno," said Mac Strann. "Maybe--maybe not. They's quite a pile that
we dunno."

"If you want to get rid of the hoss," urged Haw-Haw, writhing in the
glee of a new inspiration, "now's the time for it, Mac. Get out your gun
and pot the black. Before the crowd can get after us, we'll be miles
away. They ain't a saddled hoss in sight. Well, if you don't want to do
it, I will!" And he whipped