ns,
when a peremptory voice called, "Halt!" At the same moment the coach
lights flashed upon a masked and motionless horseman in the road. Bill
made an impulsive reach for his whip, but in the same instant checked
himself, reined in his horses with a suppressed oath, and sat perfectly
rigid. Not so the expressman, who caught up his rifle, but it was
arrested by Bill's arm, and his voice in his ear!

"Too late!--we're covered!--don't be a d----d fool!"

The inside passengers, still encompassed by obscurity, knew only that
the stage had stopped. The "outsiders" knew, by experience, that they
were covered by unseen guns in the wayside branches, and scarcely moved.

"I didn't think it was the square thing to stop you, Bill, till you'd
got through your work," said a masterful but not unpleasant voice, "and
if you'll just hand down the express box, I'll pass you and the rest of
your load through free. But as we're both in a hurry, you'd better look
lively about it."

"Hand it down," said Bill gruffly to the expressman.

The expressman turned with a white check but blazing eyes to the
compartment below his seat. He lingered, apparently in some difficulty
with the lock of the compartment, but finally brought out the box and
handed it to another armed and masked figure that appeared mysteriously
from the branches beside the wheels.

"Thank you!" said the voice; "you can slide on now."

"And thank you for nothing," said Bill, gathering up his reins. "It's
the first time any of your kind had to throw down a tree to hold me up!"

"You're lying, Bill!--though you don't know it," said the voice
cheerfully. "Far from throwing down a tree to stop you, it was I sent
word along the road to warn you from crashing down upon it, and sending
you and your load to h-ll before your time! Drive on!"

The angry Bill waited for no second comment, but laying his whip over
the backs of his team, drove furiously forward. So rapidly had the whole
scene passed that the inside passengers knew nothing of it, and even
those on the top of the coach roused from their stupor and inglorious
inaction only to cling desperately to the terribly swaying coach as it
thundered down the grade and try to keep their equilibrium. Yet,
furious as was their speed, Yuba Bill could not help noticing that the
expressman from time to time cast a hurried glance behind him. Bill knew
that the young man had shown readiness and nerve in the attack, although
both were ho