A Pagan of the Hills

by Charles Neville Buck

He struck a match for a survey of the place where he must make his last stand and his eye fell on the coil of rope. Then, for the first time, he remembered its use, and vainly wished that the chute could be opened from within. By the light of other matches, he looked over into the great bin and what he saw astonished him. There was a moving suction at the center of the pile—a slow motion and declivity—though this afternoon the stuff had been heaped into a well-rounded mound. Further scrutiny verified the amazing results of his first impression. The hopper was open!

Jerry O'Keefe smiled grimly. His enemies had an ironic sense of humor, he thought. They meant to give him a choice of deaths, death at the door by flame and lead or death in the sluice by suffocation. Then an incredulous exclamation burst from his lips. Was there not a wild and wholly improbable chance that this opening of an avenue might be Alexander's work? It seemed unlikely, almost inconceivable, but in resourcefulness and adroitness of thought nothing was quite inconceivable of Alexander.

She knew of the rope and its former use—and that meant that the flowing tide would not have to spell death for him if he waited long enough and acted wisely enough. Presumably these enemies were not neighbors, for if they had been they would not be burning their own grain. If that were granted it might follow that they would not know of the rope.

Jerry breathed deeply, and a desperate smile came for an instant to his tight lips.

He was watching the unhurried flow of out-running wheat and gauging, as was the girl below, the racing progress of the flames. Would there be time? The door was cut off now by sheets of fire and he had no longer any alternative. If the hot enemy reached him before the wheat was out, he must die by it or end matters with his own pistol.

He uncoiled the rope and threw its loose end into the bin, watching with a fascinated gaze the fashion in which it was dragged inward and downward.

In the increasing heat of the inferno he had thrown off his coat, and now his shirt went too. The sweat poured out of his naked chest and shoulders.

From rafters below him shot wicked tongues of widening flame— His breath was labored and his life seemed to wither. There was only a little grain left now at the bottom of the receptacle but there was also little strength or endurance left in him. His eyes burned horribly and he knew that he could no longer support his weight on a rope by the strength of his arms. He had climbed to the edge of the bin, and clung there. Then he fainted, and fell inward.

But the moment had arrived when at last the way was clear. The chute, polished smooth by the flowing kernels, did not even leave a splinter in his bare flesh, and when he shot down and out he fell on the soft mound of wheat that had gone before him.

Alexander's straining eyes saw his body flash into sight, and saw that it seemed lifeless. With a cry that she tried to stifle and could not, she called upon her last strength, and climbed into the great pen where he lay insensible.