buildings, about one hundred yards away, where the
shallow Laramie curled and lapped beneath their walls, and now the dogs
seemed to concentrate their attention on that side. Folsom, rifle in
hand, was kneeling on the porch, listening intently. Two of the hands
were with him. Jake and Lannion, experienced and reliable, had been
given independent posts on the other front, and just as objects could be
dimly recognized along the flats, there burst upon the ears of the
little garrison a sudden chorus of exultant yells. A tongue of flame
leaped upward from beyond the huts lately occupied by the ranchmen. The
half-used haystacks caught and held one moment the fiery messenger, and
then in a broad glare that reddened the flood of the Laramie for miles
and lighted up the ranch like a sunburst, gave forth a huge column of
blaze and smoke that could be seen far over the Black Hills of Wyoming,
and all the valley seemed to spring to instant life. On every side arose
the stirring war-cry of the Sioux, the swift beat of pony hoofs, the
ring of rifle, and brave John Folsom's heart sank within him as he
realized that here was no mere marauding party, but a powerful band
organized for deliberate vengeance. The Laramie plains were alive with
darting, yelling, painted horsemen, circling about the ranch, hemming it
in, cutting it off from the world.

The bullets came whistling through the morning air, biting fiercely into
the solid logs, spattering the chinking, smashing pane after pane. Some
of the dogs came howling and whining back for shelter, though the
mastiffs held their ground, fiercely barking and bounding about, despite
the whistles and calls from the besieged who sought to save them to the
last, but not once as yet had the ranch replied with a shot. Down in the
cellar women clung together or clasped their wailing children and
listened fearfully to the clamor. In Hal's room the fevered sufferer
awoke from his stupor and, demanding his rifle, struggled to rise from
the bed, and there John Folsom found Pappoose, pale and determined,
bending over her weakened brother and holding him down almost as she
could have overpowered a child. Lifting his son in his strong arms, he
bore him to the cellar and laid him upon a couch of buffalo robes.
"Watch him here, my child," he said, as he clasped her in his arms one
moment. "But on no account let any one show above ground now. There are
more of them than I thought, yet there is hope for us. So