Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1923-01-26

wise, Gale threw fOrWard tne refining
ton, and sinking on n knee, began
to shoot. He emptied the magazine.
Puffs of dust near Rojas did not even
make him turn.
Gale wheeled, rigid now, steeling
himself to one last forlorn hope-that
Mercedes could defend herself. She
had a gun. He doubted not at all that
she would use it. But, remembering
her terror of this savage, he feared
for her. Roias reached the eve or
the ledge. He halted. He crouched.
1t was the act of a panther. Mani
testify he saw Mercedes within the
cave. Then faint shots patted the air.
broke in quick echo. ROjas went
down as If struck by a heavy blow.
He was hit. But even as Gale yelled
in sheer madness the bandit leaped
erect. He seemed too quick, too sup
pie to be badly wounded. A slight,
dark hgure flashed out of the cave.
Mercedesl She backed against the
wall. Gale saw a puff of white
heard a report. But the bandit
lunged at her. Mercedes ran, not to
try to pass him, but straight for the
precipice. Her intention was plain.
But Rojas outstRpped her, even as
she reached the verge. Then a pierre
ing scream pealed across the crater
a scream of despair.
Gale closed his eyes,. He could not
bear to see more
Thorne echoed Mercedes scream.
-z.al s-rk " Nfnon fn linn
and catch the cavalryman as he stag
gered, apparently for the steep slope.
And then, as Gale dragged him back,
both fell. Gale saved his friend, but
he plunged into a choya. He drew
his hands away full of the great glis-
tening cones of thOrns.
"For Gods sake, Gale, shootI
Shoot! Kill her! XIII her!
Can't-you-see-ROjas-"
Thorne tainted.
Gale, stunned for the instant, stood
with uplifted hands, and gaZed from
Thorne across the crater. Rojas had
not killed Mercedes. He was over
towering her. His actions seemed
slow, wearing, purposeful. Hers were
violent. Lake a trapped she-wolf,
Mercedes was fighting. She tore,
struggled, flung herself.
Rojas' intention was terribly plain.
In agony now both mental and
physical, cold and sick and weak, Gale
gripped his rifle and aimed at the
struggling forms on the ledge. He
pulled the trigger. The bullet struck
up a cloud of red dust close to the
struggling couple. Again Gale fired.
hoping to hit Roias, praying to kill
Mercedes. The bullet struck high. A
third-fourth-ffth time the Reming-
ton spoken vain The rife fell from
Gales racked hands.
How horribly plain that fiend's in
tentioni Gale tried to close his eyes,
but could not. He prayed wildly for
q sudden bllndness-to faint as Thorne
had tainted. But he was transfiXed to
the spot with eyes that pierced the
red light.
Mercedes was growing weaker
seemed about to collapse.
"Oh, Jim Lash. are you dead?' cried
Gale. ooh, Laddy -. Oh, Yaqui!"
Suddenly a dark form literally fell
down the wall behind the ledge where
Rojas fought the girl. 1t sank in a
heap, then bounded erect.
"Yaqui!" screamed Gale, and he
waived his bleeding hands till the
blood despatched his face. Then he
choked. Utterance became impossible.
The Indian bent over Rojas and
flung him against the wall. Mercedes.
sinking back, lay still. When Rojas
got up the Indian stood between him
and escape from the ledge. Rojas
backed the other way along the mar
rowing shelf Of lava. His manner
was abject, stupefied. Slowly he
stepped backward.
1t was then that Gale caught the
white CLEAN of a knife in Yaquts
hand. Rojas turned and ran. Yaqui
followed slowly. His figure was dark
and menacing. But he was not in a
hurry. When he passed off the ledge
Rojas was edging farther and farther
along the wall. He was clinging now
to the lava, creeping inch by inch.
Perhaps he had thought to work
around the buttress or climb over it.
Evidently he went as far as possible.
and there he chung, ar unscalable
wall above, the abyss beneath. \
The approach of the Yaqui was like
a slow dark shadow of gloom. If it
seemed so tt the stricken Gale Nhat
must it have been to Rojas? He ap-
peared to sink against the wall. The
Yaqui stole closer and closer. He was
the savage now, and for him the mo-
ment must have been gloriied. Gale
saw him gaze up at the great circling
walls of the crater, then down into the
depths. Perhaps the red haze hang
ing above him, or the purple haze be-
low, or the deep caverns in the lava,
held for Yaqui spirits of the desert,
his gods to whom he called. Perhaps
he invoked shadows of his loved ones