cumstances.

He sprang back for another gun, and it was Mary who was waiting for him,
head and shoulders out of the cellar-pit, the rifle in her hands. She
was sobbing as she looked straight at him, yet without moisture or tears
in her eyes.

"Keep down!" he warned. "Keep down below the floor!"

He guessed what was coming. He had shown his enemies that life still
existed in the cabin, life with death in its hands, and now--from the
shelter of the other cabins, from the darkness, from beyond the light of
his flaming home, the rifle fire continued to grow until it filled the
night with a horrible din. He flung himself face-down upon the floor, so
that the lower log of the building protected him. No living thing could
have stood up against what was happening in these moments. Bullets tore
through the windows and between the moss-chinked logs, crashing against
metal and glass and tinware; one of the candles sputtered and went out,
and in this hell Alan heard a cry and saw Mary Standish coming out of
the cellar-pit toward him. He had flung himself down quickly, and she
thought he was hit! He shrieked at her, and his heart froze with horror
as he saw a heavy tress of her hair drop to the floor as she stood there
in that frightful moment, white and glorious in the face of the
gun-fire. Before she could move another step, he was at her side, and
with her in his arms leaped into the pit.

A bullet sang over them. He crushed her so close that for a breath or
two life seemed to leave her body.

A sudden draught of cool air struck his face. He missed Nawadlook. In
the deeper gloom farther under the floor he heard her moving, and saw a
faint square of light. She was creeping back. Her hands touched his arm.

"We can get away--there!" she cried in a low voice. "I have opened the
little door. We can crawl through it and into the ravine."

Her words and the square of light were an inspiration. He had not
dreamed that Graham would turn the cabin into a death-hole, and
Nawadlook's words filled him with a sudden thrilling hope. The rifle
fire was dying away again as he gave voice to his plan in sharp, swift
words. He would hold the cabin. As long as he was there Graham and his
men would not dare to rush it. At least they would hesitate a
considerable time before doing that. And meanwhile the girls could steal
down into the ravine. There was no one on that side to intercept them,
and both Keok and Nawadlook were well acquainted with