“Wait!” breathed the scout. “Wait for the attack!”
“But ther villains hev downed McGowan, Buffler!” gasped Nomad.
“Undoubtedly; but they won’t add murder to their crime, if they can help it. McGowan is safe enough, for the present. I reckon that will open his eyes as to Bernritter’s character!”
A tall man could be seen hurrying around the old powder-house toward the laboratory door. That was Andy O’Connell. He had heard the scuffle and the cry, and was not waiting for the mill-whistle to call him to the counter-attack.
O’Connell, however, did not reach the laboratory door. Suddenly he paused and whirled about, jerking a revolver from his pocket as he did so.
At the foot of the hill, where Buffalo Bill had seen the disappearing head and shoulders of Bascomb, was a pack of armed Apaches, rushing like wolves in the direction of the laboratory building. A white man was in the lead, springing over the ground with long leaps.
“Nomad,” said the scout, starting up, “you and the baron will get into the laboratory building and prevent the amalgam from being taken. Now!”
The door was flung open and the three pards rushed out. The trapper and the baron, bent only on carrying out orders, paid no attention to O’Connell or the onrushing Bascomb and his Apaches. Their business was to get into the laboratory—and they went at it.
O’Connell, whirling around and seeing the three issue from the powder-house, made up his mind that they were part of the attacking-force, and had been concealed in the powder-house for no good.
He raised his revolver and would have sent a bullet after Nomad had the scout not grabbed his arm and threw it upward.