"Are ye goin'?" demanded Lum Bangs.
"No!"
"Drop that gun or I'll drill ye, Lum Bangs!" commanded the cool voice of Emma Dean's dancing partner, his revolver now levelled at Lum.
The warning came too late.
Lum Bangs, in a sudden impulse of rage, pulled the trigger and fired point blank at Lieutenant Wingate, but the young mountaineer's warning to him, at the critical moment, had drawn Lum's thoughts from his aim, and his bullet missed its mark. Hippy heard it whistle past him close to his head.
Bang!
Barely a second had elapsed between Lum Bangs' shot and a second report.
Lum uttered a howl, and his weapon dropped from his relaxed fingers, just as Hippy sprang upon him and dealt the mountaineer a blow that felled him.
"Don't! Don't, Hippy! The man has been shot," begged Anne.
"Jump on him! Stomp on him, why don't ye?" screamed a mountain girl.