When he saw that a charge might be delayed no longer, he turned and ran swiftly along the curve of the ledge, the dogs racing with him. He, the fleetest of runners, now went at top speed. When he stopped, some hundred and fifty feet away, Garlanes and his men had barely rounded the bulge of rock to the wider part of the path.
They charged the neck of the way, and, finding the way widen, where there was nothing to take cover behind, they quite naturally hesitated for the next move of their foe.
That move came quickly. Garlanes, in the lead, heard something sing past his ear like an angry bee. The man next behind him felt something strike him over the heart, and he threw up his hands and crumpled to the floor. The walls of the mighty tunnel flung back a crashing echo to the sharp report of the rifle. Kneeling close to the wall, peering through the fitful light, Polaris watched the effect of his shot.
Vainly he hoped that superstition would come to his aid and hold the Sardanians back from the carnage. They were dismayed. By the intermittent flares of garish light from the throat of the volcano, Polaris could see their consternation in their faces and gestures; but he had not stopped them.
After a momentary examination of the body of their comrade, they came on, but slowly.
With loud cries of encouragement, Prince Minos and his men, summoned by the messenger from Garlanes, poured around the corner of the rock, and the entire body came on apace.
Again Polaris took up the retreat, running swiftly, and keeping well out of the range of the spear casting. Presently when he deemed that he must be nearly half-way around the rim of the crater, he came to another narrower part of the pathway where a large rock lay behind which he could crouch. There he decided to make his stand, and to retreat no farther until the summons of Kalin should tell him that the sledge was clear of the tunnel.
He refilled the magazine of the rifle, and waiting calmly for the flickering light to make his aim sure, he began methodically to pick off the foremost pursuers, making every bullet count. Under the pitiless accuracy of his fire, the Sardanians lagged uncertainly, but always they crept nearer.
Six times had the brown rifle sent its death unseen, almost unfelt, across the arc of the crater rim, when there was a stir among the dogs behind the marksman, a touch on his shoulder, a voice in his ear.
"Come, brother, all is ready. Haste thee before they close in!" called Kalin.