The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1908-01-31

came from the outer voids, nothing
but the wicked streaks that stabbed
the darkness. Then suddenly behind
McNamara's men the night glared
luridly as though a great furnace door
had opened and then changed shut,
while with 1t came hoarse thudding
roar that silenced the rifle play. They
raw the cook house disrupt itself and
lisintegrate into thousand flying
timbers and twisted sheets of tin
which scared upward and outward
over their heads and into the night.
AS the rocking hills ceased echoing
the sound of the vigilantes' rifles re-
Cured like the cracking Of dry sticks,
then everywhere about the defenders
the earth was dashed by falling debris,
while the iron roof rang ut the fusil-
lade.
The blast had come at their very ell
BOWS, and they were too dazed and
shaken by it to grasp its significance.
Then, before they could realize what
1t BODIED, the depths lit up again till
the raindrops were outlined distinct
and glistening like n gossamer veil of
silver, while the Office building to
their left was ripped and rended and
the adjoining walls leaped out into
looking like ghostly, sightless eyes.
The curtain of darkness closed heavier
than velvet, and the men covered in
their tracks, shielding themselves be-
hind the nearest objects or behind
Dne another's bodies, waiting for the
sky to vomit over them its rain of mis-
siles. Their backs were to the vigil
lantes now, their faces to the center.
Many had dropped their rifles. The
thunder of hoofs and the scream of
terrified horses came from the sta
bles. The cry Of a maddened beast is
weird and calculated to curdle the
blood at best, but with 1t arose hu-
man voice, shrleking from pain and
fear of death.
A wrenched and doubled mass of zinc
had hurtled out of the heavens and
struck some one down. The choking
hoarseness of the mans appeal told
the story, and those about him broke
into flight to escape what might fol-
low, to escape this danger they could
not see but which swooped out Of the
blackness above and against which
there was no defense. They fed only
to witness another and greater light
behind them by which they saw them
selves running, falling, groveling.
This time they were hurled from their
balance by conclusion (which
dwarfed the two preceding ones. Some
few stood still, staring at the rolling
smoke bank as it was revealed by the
explosion, their eyes cleaning white,
while others buried their faces in their
followed arms as if to shut out the
hellish glare, or to shield themselves
from q blow.
Out in the heart of the chaos rang
u voice loud and clear:
Beware the next blast"
AT the same instant the girdle of
sharpshooters rose up shifting the air
with their cries and charged in like
madmen through the rain of detritus.
They fired as Whey came, but 1t was
unnecessary, for there was no longer
fight. 1t was a rout. The defenders,
feeling they had escaped destruction
only by happy chance in leaving the
bunk house the instant they did, were
not minded to tarry here where the
heavens fell upon their heads. To
augment their CONSERVATION, the
horses had broken from their stalls
and were plunging through the con-
fusion. Fear swept over the men,
blind, unrcasoning, contagious, and
they rushed cut into the night, col
li1inS with their enemies, overrunning
them in tho panic to quit this spot.
Some dashed. Oft the bluff and fell
among the pits and sluices. Others
ran Up the mountain side, and covered
in the brush like quail.
AS the "Stanglers' assembled their
prisoners near the ruins, they heard
wounded men moaning in the dark
ness, so lit torches and searched out
the stricken ones. Glenister came run
ming through the smoke PAIL revolver
In hand, crying:
las any one seen McNalnard NO
one had, and when they were later as
sembled to take stock of their injuries
he was greeted by Dextrys gleeful an
nouncement:
That's the deuce Of a fight. We
amt got so much as a cold sore among
u.s."
''We have captured fourteen" an
other announced, land there may he
more out yonder in the brush"
Glenister noted with growing sur
prise that not one of the pris-