before the show is over."

The two passed out of the zone of smoke, and reached the other side
of the burning cabin just in time to see the last of the struggle. The
whole affair had not taken more than a quarter of an hour. In the end
the beach-combers had been beaten. Four had fled into the waste of sand
and sage that lay back of the shore, and had not been pursued. A fifth
had been almost hamstrung by one of the "Bertha's" coolies, and had
given himself up. A sixth, squealing and shrieking like a tiger-cat, had
been made prisoner; and Wilbur himself had accounted for the seventh.

As Wilbur and Moran came around the cabin they saw the "Bertha
Millner's" Chinamen in a group, not far from the water's edge,
reassembled after the fight--panting and bloody, some of them bare
to the belt, their weapons still in their hands. Here and there was
a bandaged arm or head; but their number was complete--or no, was it
complete?

"Ought to be one more," said Wilbur, anxiously hastening for-ward.

As the two came up the coolies parted, and Wilbur saw one of them,
his head propped upon a rolled-up blouse, lying ominously still on the
trampled sand.

"It's Charlie!" exclaimed Moran.

"Where's he hurt?" cried Wilbur to the group of coolies. "Jim!--where's
Jim? Where's he hurt, Jim?"

Jim, the only member of the crew besides Charlie who could understand or
speak English, answered:

"Kai-gingh him fin' pistol, you' pistol; Charlie him fight plenty;
bime-by, when he no see, one-piecee Kai-gingh he come up behin', shoot
um Charlie in side--savvy?"

"Did he kill him? Is he dead?"

"No, I tinkum die plenty soon; him no savvy nuttin' now, him all-same
sleep. Plenty soon bime-by him sleep for good, I tink."

There was little blood to be seen when Wilbur gently unwrapped the
torn sleeve of a blouse that had been used as a bandage. Just under the
armpit was the mark of the bullet--a small puncture already closed, half
hidden under a clot or two of blood. The coolie lay quite unconscious,
his eyes wide open, drawing a faint, quick breath at irregular
intervals.

"What do you think, mate?" asked Moran in a low voice.

"I think he's got it through the lungs," answered Wilbur, frowning in
distress and perplexity. "Poor old Charlie!"

Moran went down on a knee, and put a finger on the slim, corded wrist,
yellow as old ivory.

"Charlie," she called--"Charlie, here, don't you know me? Wake up, old
chap! It's Moran. You're not hurt