Lieutenant Wingate went over to the bound man.
“Do that again and I’ll settle you!” he hissed with all the savageness that he could put into his tone. “I mean what I say!”
Returning to the window he stood to one side watching the two men who were again holding a whispered conversation, pausing now and then to listen attentively. After a few moments of this, one raised the window an inch or so at a time and looked in. In the darkness they saw nothing.
“I reckon it’s all right. I’ll go in an’ ye foller me,” said one in a low, guarded tone of voice, whereupon he began crawling in. As he landed on his hands on the floor, Lieutenant Wingate hit him a terrific wallop on the head with the butt of his revolver, then made a swift pass with it at the head of the other man whose head was just inside the window.
It hit the fellow a glancing blow, and jerking his head from the window he fell over backwards, then staggering to his feet he ran, uttering a warning cry.
The time for secrecy, so far as Lieutenant Hippy Wingate was concerned, had passed. He sent a bullet from his revolver after the man and then discovering other prowlers trying to get into the corral, he snatched up the rifle, and fired at the ground just behind them.
The prowlers scattered in record time and a volley of shots pinged into the ranch-house in reply.
The Overland Rider now hastily turned his attention to his second victim, and in a few minutes he had the man bound and dragged to the other side of the room at a distance from the first prisoner.
“Confound the ruffians! Why couldn’t they have come singly?” he growled. “I could have caught the whole bunch. I reckon maybe there will be something doing in a few moments.”
There was. A rifle crashed out, then another, and a snapping fire was directed at the Circle O ranch-house, with Hippy lying flat on the floor waiting for the shooting to stop. It soon did, whereupon the Overlander crept to the window and peered out. Not a human being was in sight, but the watcher was too old a hand at campaigning to believe that the prowlers had gone away. He reasoned, too, that by making no return of their fire, they might believe that they had hit him. As he had surmised would be the case, a man appeared after a time just beyond the corral. The fellow darted across and disappeared behind the stable where saddles and other equipment were stored.