“Back!” yelled Jack, rising and throwing himself before his maddened braves, who were pressing forward. “Leave all this to me. This night we will rid ourselves of every enemy that infest this cave!”
Then he wheeled upon Cohoon, whose Spencer was leveled at his breast.
“What is Artena to Cohoon?” he cried.
The answer followed quickly upon the heels of the interrogative, and startled every one.
“His wife!”
The sentence roused Artena, and, starting up, she knocked the rifle from its level.
Cohoon tried to remedy the accident; but the whiz of an arrow prevented him.
He groaned; the weapon dropped from his hands, and, with a barbed shaft sticking in his side, he dropped upon his knees.
A wild yell greeted the result of the shot; but it was broken in twain by the Squaw Spy, who snatched the rifle from the ground, and, with a cry of defiance, threw herself before the man who had called her wife!