evidently upon his
knees, was the most important factor to be considered, now. Still Lee
was too far away to be certain of a hit and he meant with all of the
grim determination in him to hit something at last. He ran on drawing
the fire away from Judith. A rifle-ball sang close to his side,
another and an other. He lost the dim shape of the kneeling man, who,
he thought, had risen from his knees and was standing, his body
tight-pressed to the cabin.

"Why the devil doesn't he run for it?" wondered Lee.

But evidently, be the reason what it might, the man had no intention of
running. A bullet cut through Lee's sleeve. At last Lee answered. He
ran in closer as he fired and, running, emptied his revolver, jammed it
into his waistband, clubbed his rifle . . . and realized with something
of a shock that there were but the two rifles on the cliffs to take
into consideration. That other rifle, at the cabin, was still. Out of
ammunition? Or plugged? Or playing 'possum? Which?

"Stop shooting!" he shouted to Judith.

"I'm coming!" she cried back to him.

Almost at the same instant, their two rifles ready, they came to the
cabin. Between them on the ground a man lay at the corner, moving
helplessly, groping for his fallen gun, falling back.

"Open the door," said Bud. "I'll get him inside and we'll see who he
is. Hurry, Judith; those other jaspers are working down this way as
fast as they know how."

Judith, taking time to snatch up the fallen rifle, ran around to the
door. Lee slipped his hands under the armpits of the wounded man and
dragged him in Judith's wake. In the cabin, the door shut, Lee struck
a match and went to a little shelf where there was a candle.

"Bill Crowdy!" gasped Judith.

Almost before Lee saw the man's face he saw the canvas bag tied to his
belt, a bag identical with the one he himself had brought from the bank
at Rocky Bend.

"The man that stuck up Charlie Miller," he said slowly. "And there's
your thousand bucks, or I'm a liar. I get something of their play now:
those two fellows up there were waiting to meet him and split the swag
three ways. And I've got the guess they'll be asking a look-in yet!"

He dropped a heavy bar into its place across the door and then went to
the two small windows and fastened the heavy oaken shutters. When he
came back to Judith she was bending over the wounded man. Crowdy's
eyes were closed; he looked to be on the verge of death. The girl