the nearest coil, the head
flipped around on its half-severed neck, and the deadly jaws
automatically gaped and snapped together. Two of the dripping poison
fangs struck in the cushion of flesh on the outer edge of Ashton's
hand. With a shriek, he flung the dying snake on the floor and put the
wounded hand to his mouth.

"He struck you!" cried the voice of Isobel, "but only on the hand,
thank goodness! Wait, I'll fix it. Lie still."

She came swiftly across the room, thrusting a long-barreled automatic
pistol into its holster under a fold of her skirt. Her other hand drew
out a locket that was suspended in her bosom.

"Whiskey! I'm bitten!" panted Ashton, sucking frantically at his
wounds. "Quick! I'm bitten. Give me whiskey!"

"Steady, steady," she reassured. "It's not bad--only on your hand.
Give it to me. Here's something a thousand times better than
whiskey--permanganate."

While speaking, she caught up his neckerchief from the head of the
bunk and knotted it about the wrist of the wounded hand tightly enough
to check the circulation.

"Now hold it steady," she directed. "Won't have to use a knife. You
tore open the holes when you jerked off the horrid thing."

Obedient but still sweating with fear, he held up the bleeding hand.
She had opened her locket, in which were a number of small,
dark-purple crystals. Two of the larger ones she thrust lengthwise as
deeply as she could into the little slits gashed by the fangs. Another
large and two small crystals were all that she could force into the
openings.

"There!" she cheerily exclaimed. "That will kill the poison in short
order, and will not hurt you a particle. It's the best thing there is
to cheat rattlers,--just cheap, ordinary permanganate of potash. If
people only had sense enough always to carry a few crystals, no one
would ever die of rattlesnake bites."

"I've--I've heard that whiskey--" began Ashton.

"Yes, and far more victims die from the whiskey than from the bites,"
rejoined Isobel.

"But a stimulant--"

"Stimulant, then heart depressant--first up, then down--that's
alcohol. No, you'll get only one poison, the snake's, this time. So
don't worry. You'll soon be all right. Even had you been struck in the
face, quick action with permanganate would have saved you."

He shuddered. "Ah!... But if you had not come!"

"It was fortunate, wasn't it?" she remarked. "I did not know you were
in here. I was going up to the corral and heard the ratt