The Gazelle, by a prodigious effort, reached the wall of the calli, and by the help of her hands and feet, succeeded in reaching the roof before her intention was suspected. With the energy and fierceness of a tiger, she bounded on Doña Clara, seized her round the waist, and put a pistol to her forehead.
"Now, will you surrender?" she said furiously.
"Take care, Niña; take care," Sandoval shouted.
It was too late: Curumilla had felled her with the butt end of his rifle. The pirates rushed to her aid, but Valentine and his friends repulsed them. A horrible hand-to-hand combat began over the body of the girl, who lay senseless on the ground.
Valentine took a scrutinising glance around him; with a movement swift as thought he caught up Doña Clara, and, leaping from the calli, he fell into the midst of a detachment of Comanches, who welcomed him with shouts of joy. Without loss of time the hunter laid the maiden, who was half dead with terror, on the ground, and placing himself at the head of the warriors, he made so successful a charge, that the Apaches, surprised in their turn, were compelled to give ground. Don Pablo and the others then rejoined the hunters.
"By Jove! It is warm work," said the Frenchman, whose hair and eyebrows were scorched. "Our friend, Red Cedar, has brought this on us. I was decidedly wrong in not killing him."
In the meanwhile the Comanches had recovered from their terror; the warriors had found arms and assumed the offensive. Not only did the Apaches no longer advance, but at various points they began falling back, inch by inch, it is true but it was already a retreat. The pirates, rendered desperate by the wound of their darling child, surrounded her, and tried in vain to recall her to life. Red Cedar alone fought at the head of the Apaches, and performed prodigies of valour.
Night had set in, and the combat was still going on by the sinister glare of the fire. Valentine took Pethonista aside, and whispered a few words.
"Good," the chief answered; "my brother is a great warrior: he will save my nation."
And he straightway disappeared, making some of his men a sign to follow him.