ne object being to thus
hold the unseen enemy close and prevent him giving a second blow that
would be in the nature of a knockout.

He met with fierce resistance, but no matter how desperately the other
struggled and fought he was unable to break Perk's terrible hold, so
like that of a fighting bulldog, once its teeth have closed for keeps.

There the two antagonists rolled to and fro, striving in turn to get on
top, only to be over-turned in rotation. What made it all the more
exciting was the fact that the man in the shack, hearing all those queer
noises, must imagine his enemies were trying to burrow under the door
for he kept up frequent furious bursts of gunfire and at any moment an
unlucky roll was apt to bring the wrestlers within range of the hail of
bullets.

One thing favored Perk--he was by degrees getting over the deadening
sensation following that frightful blow on his head--apparently the
other was weakening in the same proportion that Perk was gaining
strength, showing that he must have been in anything but prime condition
when the tussle started.

It was this potent fact that gave Perk his first inkling as to the
identity of the man with whom he struggled. At first he took it for
granted the fellow was the tall confederate they had noticed with Kearns
during the late afternoon, and who had perhaps been away and returned to
the shack just at this interesting moment to find it in a state of
siege.

He had hardly begun to get an inkling as to the true state of affairs
when one of his hands, in seeking to get a firmer hold, chanced to come
in contact with something cold and hard. Then he understood just why his
antagonist seemed to be so handicapped in the scramble--he could stretch
his hands apart only so far--they were apparently held fast in some
mysterious fashion.

It burst upon Perk like a bomb from a sky chaser--why, after all this
was an old friend of his, one whom he had only recently been hugging
with all his might and main--in fact no other than the short confederate
of Kearns whom they had left beside the well but a brief time
previously.

In some manner, which was a complete mystery to Perk, he had managed to
get his legs free from that binding rope which had been wound around and
around his ankles in many coils and then knotted half a dozen times.
Perk found it hard to realize this puzzling fact, but just the same he
knew it must be the truth.

He proceeded to continue his rolling p