"Then I'll come straight back to tell you," he promised. "And—Why, what's the matter!"
She had leaned forward suddenly in her saddle, and with wide eyes was looking down the precipice. Then before she could answer there came to Oliver's hearing the sound of a distant shot from the cañon.
Now he saw a puff of white smoke above the willows on the river bank, a thousand feet below them. Then a second, and by and by another ringing report reached them, and the echoes of it went loping from wall to wall of the cañon.
"Merciful heavens!" cried Jessamy. "It's Old Man Selden! He's shot! Look at him reel in his saddle! Oh, horrors!... There he goes down on the ground!... But he's not killed! There—he's on his feet and shooting!"
Oliver, with open mouth, was staring down at the tragedy that had suddenly been staged for them in the river bed. Now several puffs of white smoke hung over the trees, and riders rode hither and thither like pigmies on pigmy horses. Now and then a stream of flame spurted horizontally, and at once another answered it. Then up barked the reports, followed by their mocking echoes.
"It's come! It's come!" wailed Jessamy. "Obed Pence, likely as not, has opened fire on Old Man Selden, and the boys are after him. Look—there's Chuck and Bolar and Jay and Winthrop—and, oh, most all of them! It's a general fight. Oh, I knew it would come! I knew it! Obed Pence has been so nasty of late. They were all drunk last night. Poor mother! Oh, what shall we do, Oliver? What can we do? We can't get down to them!"
"And could do nothing if we did," he said tensely.
Down below six-shooters still popped, and the balls of smoke continued to grow in number over the willows. Horsemen dashed madly about, shouting, firing. The two watchers learned later that Obed Pence, supported by Muenster, Allegan, and Buchanan—all drunk for two days on the fiery monkey rum—had lain in wait for Old Man Selden, and Pence had ridden out and confronted him as he rode down the river trail, supposedly alone. But the Selden boys for days had been hovering in the background, to see that their father got a square deal when he and Obed Pence next met. Pence and Adam Selden had drawn simultaneously; but the hammer of the old man's Colt had caught in the fringe of his chaps, and Obed had shot him through the left lung. Knowing their father to be a master gunman, his sons, who had not been close enough to witness the encounter, had jumped to the conclusion that Pence had fired from ambush. They charged in accordingly, and opened fire on Pence, killing him instantly. Then Pence's supporters had ridden forth in turn, and the general gun fight was on.
"I can't sit here and see them murdering one another!" Jessamy sobbed piteously. "They—they all may need killing, but—but I've lived with the old man and the boys, and—and—My mother!" The tears streamed down her cheeks as she made a trumpet of her hands and shouted down the precipice:
"Stop it! Stop it at once, I say!"