"She heard you and she
has gone for help."
"Then come!" said Billy, seizing the girl's arm and dragging
her to her feet; but they had scarce crossed half the distance
to the doorway when the cries of the old woman without
warned them that the camp was being aroused.
Billy thrust a revolver into Barbara's hand. "We gotta make
a fight of it, little girl," he said. "But you'd better die than be
here alone."
As they emerged from the hut they saw warriors running
from every doorway. The old woman stood screaming in
Piman at the top of her lungs. Billy, keeping Barbara in front
of him that he might shield her body with his own, turned
directly out of the village. He did not fire at first hoping that
they might elude detection and thus not draw the fire of the
Indians upon them; but he was doomed to disappointment,
and they had taken scarcely a dozen steps when a rifle spoke
above the noise of human voices and a bullet whizzed past
them.
Then Billy replied, and Barbara, too, from just behind his
shoulder. Together they backed away toward the shadow of
the trees beyond the village and as they went they poured shot
after shot into the village.
The Indians, but just awakened and still half stupid from
sleep, did not know but that they were attacked by a vastly
superior force, and this fear held them in check for several
minutes--long enough for Billy and Barbara to reach the
summit of the bluff from which Billy and Eddie had first been
fired upon.
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