uld be all over in much less time than it
takes to tell it, and it might well happen but for two things--the
Apache's dread of the dark and his fear of a possible hand-to-hand
fight.

Yet if Deltchay and Eskiminzin, with all their warriors were to
reeforce these about them, with five hundred braves to the garrison's
one hundred, even that dread might be overcome.

And by Monday's sundown it was known that numbers of Apaches had
crossed the valley ten miles away to the south--the telescope had told
that--and not a word or sign had been vouchsafed by Turner, and Tuesday
brought no better news. Then 'Tonio, said many a man, had played them
false.

Just at four o'clock Archer had arranged the dispositions for the
night. Mrs. Stannard, with Mrs. Archer and Lilian, were to occupy the
ground floor, north-west, room of his quarters--the one least exposed
to flying bullets in case of attack. Mrs. Bennett and the matron were
moved into a little room in the hospital. The soldiers' wives and
children were to assemble in the barracks in case of alarm. The men in
the outlying posts and pits were to be doubled at dusk--Bonner's
company attending to that, while Briggs and his fellows were to sleep
on their arms within the post. It now lacked but a few minutes of
sunset. No further demonstration had occurred. Not an Indian had been
seen within a radius of six miles, when, all on a sudden, there came a
shot--then two, almost together, then a quick crackle and sputter of
small-arms afar down the stream. "By Jove!" cried Bonner, from a perch
by the lookout at the office. "They've opened on Case and Clancy!"

[Illustration: "They've opened on Case and Clancy." Page 188]

And that was but the opening, for within a minute, from on every side,
from far out among the rocks to the west, from the sandhills across the
stream, from little heaps of brush and weed and cactus in the flats,
from the distant screen of the willows in the stream bed, little puffs
of white sulphur smoke jutted into the slanting sunshine, and the
pulseless air of declining day was suddenly set to stir and throb by
the crackle of encircling musketry. And then was seen the wisdom of the
veteran's defence. Few of the hostiles, as yet, had other than
old-fashioned muzzle-loading rifles, and few that they owned were
effective over six hundred yards. By stationing his better shots in
rifle pits well forward from the buildings on every side, Archer easily
held the foe at a d