The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-03-18

PAGES away. He took his revolver ana
fred at it, aiming to hit it just in front
and below the hammer, its most vulnera-
BILE part. Instead, the bullet hits the
ground and richocheting enters the breast
of the dead man. He shudders as the
bosy stirs from the force OF the shot, al
though he knows that life has been gone
for hours Everything is plain to him
now why his other shots had not taken
effect. He WAS unnerved. How could a
man with hole through his body hope to
hit anything He had heard of men shot
through the heart killing their assailants,
and had often wondered if he could do it.
Could Tom have done it? How far off
and vet how short seemed the years that
he and Tom had been together How
little there had been in them that seemed
worth now recalling! Crack asingle shot
off to the right, and he fires where be sees
the smoke curling upward. Fires again.
Nothing. lie counts his cartridges and is
sstouished that he has fired so many. He
must have lost some. No, there are the
empty shells.
Another shotoff to the right. One to the
front. He fires at both He feels that he
is growing nervous, and brings all his re-
manning powers into play to secure better
control of himself He viii put away the
idea of death, OF his wound, of everything
but revenge Only one and he will be sat
isfied, and for the first time ia years be
prays, prays without words, though, that
he may kill but one.
The sun is sinking lower; it has almost
reached the far Off western mountain tops.
1t would soon be night, and then what
would they do, Steal up under cover
of the darkness and shoot him from behind
some bowlder before he would be aware OF
il. He would keep close lookout, and
perhaps he might after all get" one OF
them.
Crack crack, TO the right and left, and
he glances in both directions, firing at each; :.
and then right over him takes place a ter
rible explosion, and NE feels as If something
heavy and blunt had struck him in the
back. He half raises himself, just enough
to turn his face upward. Another explo-
sion, another heavy, blunt blow, and
through the smoke fsom revolver he sees
dark young fsce, with black, glittering
ewes. white teeth, acrctss which the lips are
tightly drawn-the Is ce and the form OF
one almost boy-end then he falls back
while a dark hand and arm snatches his
gun from his half clinging grasp. He hears
wild shouting, and through his glazing eyes
sees dark forms serAm bling for his arms,
for Toms. They are even Quarreiing IN
their eagerness TO tear the pack from the
dead burro, and then instinctively be sees
one raise something In the air. and
when it falls there is no longer anything
human in the face or the head Of the man
who has spent the afternoon IN fight.
Nothing but bloody pulp of skull, hair,
brains, broken teeth. crushed into mis-
shapen mass by the bowider cast upon il by
an Apache.
Another afternoon, years after. tall
sergeant and his detail of cavalry escorting
through the canyon party lacating road,
looks down on the whirened bones Of two
men and a burro scattered by coyotes and
bleached by the winds and rains, and as
he. with the toe of his boot pushes 20 one
sida rhs rihA Of one OF the skeletons Us