A man, his face distorted with pain, stood up behind the fallen tree trunk, the upper part of his body in plain view.
His rage had made him reckless, and he had stood erect the better to aim his rifle at the fissure in which Sanderson was concealed. He fired—and missed, for Sanderson had ducked at the movement. Sanderson heard the bullet strike the rock wall above his head, and go ricochetting into the cleft behind him.
He peered out again instantly, to see that the man was lying doubled across the fallen tree trunk, his rifle having dropped, muzzle down, in some bushes below him.
Sanderson heard Williams' voice, raised in savage exultation:
"Nip my ear, will you—yon measly son-of-a-gun! I'll show you!
"Got him with my pistol!" he yelled to one of the Double A men near him. "Come on out and fight like men, you miserable whelps!"
The young engineer's fighting blood was up—that was plain to Sanderson. Sanderson grinned, yielded to a solemn hope that Williams would not get reckless and expose himself needlessly, and began to examine the walls of the fissure to determine on a new offensive movement.
He was interrupted, though, by another shout from Williams.
"Got him!" yelled the engineer; "plumb in the beezer!"
Sanderson peered out, to see the body of a man come tumbling down the opposite wall of the defile.