“Please be careful!” she whispered finally, leaning over a trifle. “And if there’s any way you can, will you let me know that everything has come out all right? I couldn’t close my eyes until I know—”
“Sure. Now for the love of Mike, pretty lady, beat it!”
She had not disappeared from sight before Hemingwood and Apperson were busy. A big rock, protruding two feet above the ground, was the cornerstone of their defense. The ship was standing by the fence, the tent thirty feet away from it and ten feet from the edge of the forest. The rock was in a corner of the field nearest the road, perhaps forty feet from both tent and ship.
They worked with breathless haste, carrying the fence rails over to the rock and constructing their barricade. In a half hour they had a small, three sided fortification of which the rock formed the apex facing the tent, where Hemingwood figured most of the action would take place, if any. The machine guns were useless—there was no time to dismount them.
He was right about the scene of battle. Less than half an hour from the time they had ensconced themselves in their shelter, lying flat on the ground, they heard a rustling in the bushes behind the tent. Although the moonlight was flooding the world in silver radiance, they could see no signs of the men they knew were there.
For taut minutes there was utter silence. Hemingwood wondered whether the low structure of rails and rock behind which they were hidden would catch the marauders’ eyes and scare them off. He hoped it would, but the chances were against it.
It was fully ten minutes before six ghostly figures, long rifles in hand, slipped out of the bushes and started to surround the tent. Hemingwood acted before any of them went out of sight behind it.
He shot his Colt in the air, and shouted, “Drop your guns! Hands up!”
“Quick!” bellowed Apperson, to let them know there was more than one gun trained on them.
For an instant six men, vague in the moonlight, stood like statues. Hemingwood shot again, shouting at the same time: “Next shot I’ll get someone! Drop those guns!”