"The veranda!"

For some moments Engelhardt said nothing. When at last he found his voice it was to abuse himself and his works with such unnecessary violence that again that soft warm palm lay for an instant across his lips. His pride in his own ingenuity had been cruelly humbled, for he had to confess that he had entirely forgotten to reckon with the store-veranda, a perfect shelter against even the deadliest fusillade from his position.

"Very well," he cried at last. "We'll drill a hole through the door, but we must drill it near the top, and at an angle, so that they can't put a bullet through it at a distance."

"Then let me do it," said Naomi. She sprang upon the flour-bag, and the hole was quickly made. Still the men did not return. "Lucky thing I remembered the axe in time!" she continued, remaining where she was.

"They would have hacked in the door in no time with that. I say, Mr.

Engelhardt, this is my post. I mean to stick here."

"Never!" he cried.

"But you can't work both revolvers."

"Well, then, let us change places. You'll probably shoot straighter than I should. I'll stand on the flour-bag with the barrel of the other revolver through the hole you've made. If any one of them gets in a line with it----well, there'll be a villain less!"

"And Mrs. Potter shall load for us," cried Naomi. "Do you know how?"

"Can't say I do, miss."

"Then I'll show you."

This was the work of a moment. The old bush-woman was handy enough, and cool enough too, now that she was getting used to the situation. It was her own idea to bring round the storekeeper's tall stool, to plant it among the props, within reach of Naomi on the boxes and of Engelhardt on the flour-bag, and to perch herself on its leather top with the box of cartridges in her lap. Thus prepared and equipped, this strange garrison waited for the next a.s.sault.

"Here they come," cried Naomi at last, with a sudden catch in her voice.

"They're carrying a great log they must have fished out from the very bottom of the wood-heap. All the top part of the heap was small wood, and I guess they've wasted some more time in hunting for the axe. But here they are!" She pushed her revolver through the slit in the roof, and the sharp report rang through the store.

"Hit anybody?" said Engelhardt next moment.

"No. They're stopping to fire back. Ah, you were right."

As she spoke there was a single report, followed by three smart raps on the sloping roof. The bullet had ricochetted like a flat stone flung upon a pond. Another and another did the same, and Naomi answered every shot.

"For G.o.d's sake take care!" cried the piano-tuner.

"I am doing so."

"Hit any one yet?"

"Not yet; it's impossible to aim; and they've never come nearer than the well-palings. Ah!"

"What now?"

"They're charging with the log."

Engelhardt slipped his revolver into his pocket, and grasped the shelf that jutted out over the lintel. He felt that the shock would be severe, and so it was. It came with a rush of feet and a volley of loud oaths--a crash that smashed the lock and brought three of the clothes-props clattering to the ground. But those secured by gimlet and bradawl still held; and though the lower part of the door had given an inch the upper fitted as close as before, and the hinges were as yet uninjured.

"One more does it!" cried Bill. "One more little rush like the last, and then, by G.o.d, if we don't make the three of you wish you was well dead, send me to quod again for ten year! Aha, you devil with the pistol! Very nice you'd got it arranged, but it don't cover us here. No, no, we've got the bulge on you now, you swine you! And you can't hit us, neither!

We're going to give you one chance more when we've got our breath--just one, and then----"

By holding on to the shelf when the crash came Engelhardt had managed to stand firm on the flour-bag. Seeing that the door still held, though badly battered, he had put his eye to the loop-hole bored by Naomi, and it had fallen full on Bill. A more b.e.s.t.i.a.l sight he had never seen, not even in the earlier hours of that night. The bloated face was swimming with sweat, and yet afire with rage and the l.u.s.t for blood. The cross-eyes were turned toward the holes in the roof, hidden from them by the veranda, and the hairy fist with the four fingers was being savagely shaken in the same direction. The man was standing but a foot from the door, and when Engelhardt removed his eye and slipped his pistol-barrel in the place, he knew that it covered his midriff, though all that he could see through the half-filled hole was a fragment of the obscene, perspiring face. It was enough to show him the ludicrous change of expression which followed upon a sudden lowering of the eyes and a first glimpse of the protruding barrel. Without a moment's hesitation Engelhardt pressed the trigger while Bill was stupidly repeating:

"And then--and then----"

A flash cut him short, and as the smoke and the noise died away, Engelhardt, removing the pistol once more and applying his eye, saw the wounded brute go reeling and squealing into the moonshine with his hand to his middle and the blood running over it. To the well-palings he reeled, dropping on his knees when he got there, but struggling to his feet and running up and down and round and round like a mad bull, still screaming and blaspheming at the top of his voice, and with the blood bubbling over both his hands, which never ceased to hug his wound. His mates rushed up to him, but he beat them off, cursing them, spitting at them, and covering them with blood as he struck at them with his soaking fists. It was their fault. They should have let him have his way. He would have done for that h.e.l.l-begotten swine who had now done for him.

It was they who had killed him--his own mates--and he told them so with shrieks and curses, varied with sobs and tears, and yet again with wild shots from a revolver which he plucked from his belt. But he dropped the pistol after madly discharging it twice, and clapping his hand to his middle, as though he could only live by pressing the wound with all his force, he rushed after them, foaming at the mouth and squirting blood at every stride. At last he seemed to trip, and he fell forward in a heap, but turned on one side, his knees coming up with a jerk, his feet treading the air as though running still. And for some seconds they so continued, like the screws of a foundering steamer; then he rolled over heavily; his two companions came up at a walk; one of them touched him with his foot; and Engelhardt stepped down from the flour-bag with a mouth that had never relaxed, and a frown that had never gone.

Naomi was no longer standing on the boxes; but she was sitting on them, with her face in her hands; and in the light of the two candle-ends, Mrs. Potter was watching her with a white dazed face.

"Cheer up!" said Engelhardt. "The worst is over now."

"Is he dead?" said Naomi, uncovering her face.

"As dead as a man can be."

"And you shot him?"

She knew that he had; but the thing seemed incredible as she sat and looked at him; and by the time it came fully home to her, the little musician was inches taller in her eyes.

"Yes, I shot the brute; and I'll shoot that shearer, too, if I get half a chance."

Naomi felt nervous about it, and sufficiently shocked. She was dubiously remarking that they had not committed murder, when she was roughly interrupted.

"Haven't they!"

"Whom have they murdered?"

"You'll see."

"I know!" cried Mrs. Potter, with sudden inspiration; but even as they looked at her, a voice was heard shouting from a respectful distance outside.

"We're going," it cried. "We've had enough of this, me and Simons have.

Only when they find that chap in the paddock, recollect it was Bill that hung him. But for us he'd have hung you, too!"

They listened very closely, but they heard no more. Then Naomi stood up to look through the slit in the roof.

"The yard is empty," she cried. "Their horses are gone! Oh, Mr.

Engelhardt--Mr. Engelhardt--we are saved!"

CHAPTER XVI

IN THE MIDST OF DEATH

The candle-ends had burnt out in the store; the moon no longer shone in through the skylight; but the latter was taking new shape, and a harder outline filled with an iron-gray that whitened imperceptibly, like a man's hair. The strange trio within sat still and silent, watching each other grow out of the gloom like figures on a sensitive film. The packet of meat and bread was reduced to a piece of paper and a few crumbs; the little flask was empty, and the water-bag half its former size; but now that all was over, the horror of the night lay heavier upon them than during the night itself. It was Naomi who broke the long silence at last.

"They have evidently gone," she said. "Don't you think we might venture now?"