I saw his hand fumble again on his breast, and thought it was in an attempt to open his shirt; but then I caught the agony in his eye, such as you may have seen on a dumb man trying to make himself understood and failing in the attempt. Something of that look, but more woeful, more piteous to see, was on his face. He was trying to hold his hand to me; when I took it, he smiled and said:
"You or Apache—Meg." And that was the last of this kindly and likeable man who had done so much for us.
But what of the half-breed? Was he, too, slain? Not so; but he was of a more cunning race than I am sprung of. When I laid back Mr. Pinkerton's head and again looked around, the half-breed was gone from the place where he had lain.
There, on his belly almost, he was creeping upon Farrell from the rear. To me it seemed the maddest and most forlorn undertaking.
There was Farrell with the two revolvers held to Apache Kid's head, talking softly, too quietly for me to hear, and Apache Kid replying in a low tone without any attempt at rising. And Farrell cried out: "Nobody try to fire on me! At a shot I fire too! My fingers is jest ready. I 'm a desperate man."
I crouched low, my breath held in dread, my heart pounding in my side, at long intervals, so that I thought it must needs burst. I did not even dare look again at that crawling savage, lest Farrell might perhaps cast another such quick glance as he had already bestowed on me and, seeing the direction of my gaze, realise his danger.
The result of such a discovery I dared not imagine. There was enough horror already, without addition. It was just then that Donoghue gave a queer little wheezing moan and his eyes opened; but even as I turned to him, "crash!" went a shot and I spun round, a cry on my lips; and there lay Apache Kid, as I had seen him before Donoghue's voice called me away from observing him. But now he had clutched Farrell's right wrist in what must have been a mighty sudden movement, and was pushing it from him. He had leapt sidewise a little way, but without attempting to rise.
There, thrusting away, in a firm grasp, the hand that held the smoking weapon, he still looked up in Farrell's eye, the other revolver before him so that he must have looked fairly into it.
"You durn fool!" said Farrell. "You think I did n't mean what I said? Well, let me tell you that I run no more chances. Oh! you need n't grasp this arm so fierce. I don't have to use it. But, Apache Kid, I 'm goin' to kill you now. I reckon that that there Lost Cabin ain't for any of us,—not for you, for sure. Are you ready?"
"Quite ready," I heard Apache Kid say, his voice as loud as Farrell's now, but more exultant still. It horrified me to hear his voice so callous as he looked on death. I wondered if now I should not risk a shot as a last hope to save him.