"There won't be any signal fires to-night," replied Buck, slowly, "if you want my advice. It's one thing for a bluffin' Ute to walk up in the daylight when you've got a fair chance to give him as good as he sends, and its another thing for him to get a bead on you a sittin' in the light o' yer camp fire—him in the dark."
Elmer saw and understood.
So night fell in silence with Buck and Elmer keyed up and ready to meet any possible attack.
Nothing happened until several hours had passed. Neither Elmer nor Buck were any the less alert, however. The old scout was pacing up and down in front of the barricade and perhaps a hundred feet from it. Elmer could just hear his soft footfalls in the sand. Suddenly these ceased. Almost at the same moment there was the crack of Buck's rifle, a groan and a moment later the scout was inside the barricade.
"I guess I got him all right," he whispered, "he was makin' too much noise."
This was the shot Ned heard miles away in the Cibola.
Again for some minutes there was no sound and then, suddenly and from the left, came a spit of flame in the dark. Almost before Elmer heard the explosion Buck's gun had spoken in reply. Both bullets went wild, but Buck explained that it was necessary to give shot for shot, "and right at 'em," said Buck, "as it takes a little o' the ginger out o' them."
But the besiegers had undoubtedly widened out. The next signs of them were two shots, almost together. Elmer's rifle made quick reply, but, to the boy's surprise, Buck failed to fire in return. The scout had disappeared from his companion's side. Before Elmer could call out he heard a rush at the end of the barricade, and then two explosions almost together and not ten feet away. He could not describe the sound that followed, but he knew that it meant the convulsions of human beings in agony. He whispered his companion's name, but there was no answer—only a gasp.
In the black darkness the colored boy, revolver in hand, crawled forward. At the end of the barricade Buck's body was lying. As the boy's hand fell on the old man's breast he knew that it was blood he felt.
"Buck," he whispered, "Buck! Is yo' hurt?"