D’Arcy was for following Shanks’ advice. They debated the point for a few minutes and then decided to attempt an attack. But the decision was made too late. There came a diabolical yell down the ravine. Shanks ran to a loop-hole.
“Gosh!—they’re coming—the whole lot of them!” he cried.
The three men ran to their posts and commenced firing at the leaping figures of the Thlinklets. Three or four of them bit the snow, but the remainder reached the hut. Shots came 218 through and the sound of hatchets sounded on the thick logs.
D’Arcy fired and a scream of anguish followed. Then he threw up his arms and fell back with a groan, his rifle sticking in the slit through which it had fired. Shanks ran to him, and saw a round hole through his coat, near the heart, around which the blood was freezing as it issued. There was obviously nothing to be done with D’Arcy. Shanks dragged the rifle from the hole and reloaded it, cursing and swearing like a madman. Still came the steady thud, thud of the hatchets, but they rang much more hollow, and the two defenders expected to see part of the wall go down at any moment. Suddenly the sound of hatchets ceased and some of the noise subsided. Lonagon peeped through a crack, and saw half a dozen Indians coming up with a battering-ram in the shape of a felled tree. They approached at a wide angle, out of the line of fire.
“Shanks, it’s all up. Get your six shooter—we’ll have the black devils inside in a minute.”
Shanks flung down the rifle and snatched the revolver from his belt. He bent low and took a glimpse at what was happening outside. The 219 Indians were but twenty yards away, and preparing to charge the half dissected portion of the wall with their heavy ram. He tried to get a shot at them, but could not get enough angle on to the revolver.
He saw them ambling towards him, and then, to his surprise, one of them gasped and pitched headlong. The remainder stood, transfixed, at this inexplicable occurrence. Before they recovered from their amazement another man howled with pain and placed one hand over a perforated shoulder. From afar came the sharp crack of a firearm. Shanks suddenly saw the shooter, high up on the ice wall above them.
“Gee whiz! Lonagon—it’s a big feller up on the cliff! Whoever he is, he’s got Buffalo Bill beaten to a frazzle. Did you see that? A bull’s-eye at three hundred feet, and with a six-shooter. It clean wallops the band!”
He unbarred the door, as the remaining Thlinklets went helter-skelter down the ravine, and waved his hands to the figure above him. Lonagon turned to the still form of D’Arcy. He lifted the latter on the camp-bed, poured some 220 whisky between his teeth, and saw the eyes open and shine glassily.
“How’s it going?” he queried.