He did not finish counting. With the rapidity of lightning the two prisoners leaped in opposite directions.
There was the report of a pistol held in Mason’s hand.
The bullet whistled by Frank Reade, Jr.’s, ear.
But the young inventor did not pause. He rushed madly into the arms of one of the guards.
Before the fellow could make resistance Frank had struck him a terrific blow in the stomach which stretched him out upon the ground.
Then he sped away across the plateau like a deer.
Rifle bullets followed him, and though his clothes were shot full of holes, miraculously he was not injured.
But Beaver Bill was having a decidedly harder time.
He had been clutched by several of the foe, and a lively struggle followed.
The trapper was the center of a struggling mass of the counterfeiters, but was making a valiant struggle, when a loud yell of alarm went up on the air.