“What did he say?” asked the girl.

“That he is glad we are back.  He heard the shots and came to meet us.”

“And what else?” she persisted.

“Old Sokwenna is superstitious—­and nervous.  He said some things that you wouldn’t understand.  You would probably think him mad if he told you the spirits of his comrades slain in the kloof many years ago were here with him tonight, warning him of things about to happen.  Anyway, he has been cautious.  No sooner were we out of sight than he hustled every woman and child in the village on their way to the mountains.  Keok and Nawadlook wouldn’t go.  I’m glad of that, for if they were pursued and overtaken by men like Graham and Rossland—­”

“Death would be better,” finished Mary Standish, and her hand clung more tightly to his arm.

“Yes, I think so.  But that can not happen now.  Out in the open they had us at a disadvantage.  But we can hold Sokwenna’s place until Stampede and the herdsmen come.  With two good rifles inside, they won’t dare to assault the cabin with their naked hands.  The advantage is all ours now; we can shoot, but they won’t risk the use of their rifles.”

“Why?”

“Because you will be inside.  Graham wants you alive, not dead.  And bullets—­”

They had reached Sokwenna’s door, and in that moment they hesitated and turned their faces back to the gloom out of which they had fled.  Voices came suddenly from beyond the corrals.  There was no effort at concealment.  The buildings were discovered, and men called out loudly and were answered from half a dozen points out on the tundra.  They could hear running feet and sharp commands; some were cursing where they were entangled among the nigger-heads, and the sound of hurrying foes came from the edge of the ravine.  Alan’s heart stood still.  There was something terribly swift and businesslike in this gathering of their enemies.  He could hear them at his cabin.  Doors opened.  A window fell in with a crash.  Lights flared up through the gray mist.

It was then, from the barricaded attic window over their heads, that Sokwenna’s rifle answered.  A single shot, a shriek, and then a pale stream of flame leaped out from the window as the old warrior emptied his gun.  Before the last of the five swift shots were fired, Alan was in the cabin, barring the door behind him.  Shaded candles burned on the floor, and beside them crouched Keok and Nawadlook.  A glance told him what Sokwenna had done.  The room was an arsenal.  Guns lay there, ready to be used; heaps of cartridges were piled near them, and in the eyes of Keok and Nawadlook blazed deep and steady fires as they held shining cartridges between their fingers, ready to thrust them into the rifle chambers as fast as the guns were emptied.

In the center of the room stood Mary Standish.  The candles, shaded so they would not disclose the windows, faintly illumined her pale face and unbound hair and revealed the horror in her eyes as she looked at Alan.