class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 31]"/> sight; hide in the reeds. We'll take care of Tommy."

Then he ran back through the house toward his father. He reached him in less time than it takes to tell it; but the half-breed, cursing frightfully as he reeled back from Mr. Briscoe's thrust, had already shouted to his companions,

"Shoot him!"

One of the mounted Indians threw his musket to his shoulder but Mr. Briscoe, seizing the shotgun which Al had set beside the door, was quicker than the savage. His shot rang out and the Indian pitched headlong to the ground. Before he could cock the other hammer or even spring aside from the doorway, the half-breed's rifle cracked.

"My God! Mary!" gasped Mr. Briscoe, clutching his hand to his breast. He wheeled, staggered a step or two into the room and then sunk to the floor at Al's feet, dead.

It had all happened so quickly that the poor boy's brain was reeling with the horror of it. But in an instant he saw the half-breed's form silhouetted in the doorway, an evil grin overspreading his face. Mechanically Al raised the revolver in his hand and fired. Without a word, his father's murderer tumbled backward through the doorway and rolled out on the ground. Al stepped to the door. In one swift glance he saw three of the four remaining Indians galloping furiously away toward the meadow; he saw Tommy, half way between the barn and house, running toward the latter, and he saw the fourth Indian, leaning far over from his pony's side, swooping down upon the boy. The warrior looked back toward the house and in that instant's glimpse Al noted that he was a huge fellow, over six feet tall and that along his left cheek, down his neck and clear out on his naked shoulder, extended a long, livid scar as of an old and terrible wound by a sabre or knife. Again Al fired. But the Indian was some distance away and the bullet apparently missed him altogether. Before Al could get another aim the savage had caught Tommy, screaming and struggling, from the ground and, swinging him up on the pony's back, had ridden swiftly after his companions.

For a moment Al was beside himself with grief and rage. His brother was being carried away under his very eyes, probably to torture and death, and he could do nothing. He ran out madly after the fleeing Indians, shouting senseless threats and waving his arms. But he dared not fire, for the last rider held Tommy, struggling fiercely in his iron grip, as a shield between himself and pursuing bullets. In a few seconds all the Indians had disappeared in the strip of woods and then Al remembered his mother and sister. He abandoned his futile pursuit and ran to the house, not even glancing at the dead Indian in the yard nor the one before the door. Rushing into the kitchen, he threw himself in a paroxysm of grief beside his father's body, crying out to him and vainly striving to discover a sign of life in the quiet face, already grown so peaceful under the soothing touch of death. At length, with dry, silent sobs shaking his body, he rose slowly to his feet, closed and locked the door, composed his father's limbs and spread a cloth over his face. Then he picked up the musket, got the powder horn and box of bullets from the shelf, and, with one last glance at the still form on the floor, ran swiftly through the house and out, striking directly down the slope toward the marshy ground along the creek.

CHAPTER II THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE DARKNESS

Al had almost reached the nearest reeds when he heard a shot off to his left and looking in that direction saw Spot, the cow, sink to her knees and then topple over on her side. An Indian with rifle held aloof, exulting over this piece of slaughter, was galloping toward her. Al crouched low and ran into the reeds.

"Mother! Mother!" he called, softly, for the Indian was too far away to hear.

"Here," answered his mother's voice, not far off, and in a moment he had crept to her. Annie, crying softly, was beside her, and they were lying well hidden in a dense thicket of reeds close to the creek.

"Where is your father?" whispered Mrs. Briscoe, the instant he reached her, gazing at him with wide, terror-stricken eyes.

"Why, he—he—can't come now," Al faltered.

"He is killed," said Mrs. Briscoe, simply, in a lifeless voice.

Her son did not look at her.

"Yes," he said, almost inaudibly.

It seemed to him that the end of all things was closing down upon them. His mother did not weep; she was past tears. She did not even move, but her face was almost like chalk.

"And Tommy?" she asked presently.

"The Indians have carried him away," answered Al.

Mrs. Briscoe bowed her head upon her knees.

"Oh, my little boy, my baby boy!" she moaned. "Why should I live any longer with them gone?"

Al, stunned by the tragedies of the past few minutes, had nearly reached the lowest depths of despair. He felt numb and helpless, but at his mother's heartbroken cry a sudden rush of vitality and determination reanimated him. He recalled his father's words: "Remember that your first care must be your mother and your little brother and sister." He leaned forward and put his arm around his mother's shoulders.

"Mother," he said, "don't say that. You must live for Annie's sake and mine,—and Tommy's. We shall get him back; they will not hurt him, he is so young and bright. When we reach the fort the soldiers will send out after him."

By a mighty effort Mrs. Briscoe controlled herself. Her son's words had aroused her.

"You are right, Al," she said. "I must live for you and Annie and Tommy. But can we start for the fort now?"

"I am afraid we shall have to stay here till dark," he replied. "The Indians are still around. I will crawl up where I can get a look."

Leaving the musket beside his mother he crept up through the reeds until, by raising his head cautiously, he could see the house, about three hundred feet away at the top of the slope. An Indian was coming out of the barn leading Chick and Monty, both animals rearing and plunging wildly, for a horse brought up in civilization fears an Indian as much as he does a wolf. Al also saw columns of smoke beginning to arise from the roofs of the house and barn and realized with a terrible pang that his father's body was about to be incinerated in the ruins of his home. He felt a mad desire to rush from his concealment upon the savages and to fight them single-handed. But he restrained himself, for he realized that he would have no chance even against the four who were certainly there and who, for all he knew, might now have been joined by others. He lay there watching until the house and barn were wrapped in flames. Then two of the Indians rode out in opposite directions and making wide detours, circled around toward the swampy tract. Then he crept hastily back to his mother and gave her the revolver, the two empty chambers of which he had already re-loaded, himself taking the musket.

"They are going to search for us, mother," he whispered. "We must keep perfectly still. If they should find us and I should be hit, shoot Annie and then yourself. Never let them take you alive. But if there are only four of them we still have a good chance."

No more was said, and for a long time they lay quiet, their ears sharpened to unnatural keenness, listening to the snapping of reeds in the marsh to the east and west of them but never very close. The conviction at last came upon Al that their