“Diablo! The fiend himself is in those Gringoes,” he raved, “I think they have broken every bone in my body.”
“More fool you, for not being more cautious,” growled Ramon, and then, raising his voice, he shouted up in English:
“It will be of no use to you to resist. I have a superior force and if you injure another of my men when I do get you it will go hard with you. Surrender and give me the money and no harm will come to you with the exception of Jack Merrill. I mean to deal with him as I choose.”
“When you get him, you dog,” shouted Coyote Pete, “which won’t be yet or for a long time to come,—ah! you would, would you!”
As he spoke, the cow-puncher had projected his head thoughtlessly over the edge of the trap door. A bullet aimed to kill, which, however, whizzed harmlessly by his ear, was the result. The missile sang through the air and buried itself in one of the rafters.
“We’ll give you all you want of that directly,” hailed Coyote Pete, essaying what is sometimes called “a bluff,” “we have plenty of rifles and ammunition, and we can use them, too, so bring on your next man.”
“You shall smart for this, you Gringo pig,” cried Ramon from below. Evidently the complete failure of his first attack and Coyote’s bantering tone had driven him beside himself with fury.
“Oh, I’m a smart fellow, anyhow,” chuckled Coyote Pete, “come on. One cigar for every head I crack. That’s the way they do it at the county fair with the Jolly Nigger Dodger, and I don’t know as you greasers have anything on him.”
“Rush up and bring them down out of that!” screamed Ramon furiously. But the sharp lesson they had just had seemed to hold the Mexicans in check. Evidently the Gringoes above were not to be trifled with. Ramon strode up and down the room stamping and raging and biting his nails. Altogether he was in a fit of black Latin rage which is not so very different from the tantrums we occasionally find in our own nurseries.
“Why not come up yourself, Ramon?” was Coyote’s next thrust. “If your head is burning with such blazing thoughts it must need ventilating.”