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 were still sitting in their saddles, not thinking it worth while to dismount over such a trivial affair.

Sick as he was, dizzy as the world and dark before his vision; racked by such agony as no man endures twice, the desire for revenge leaped as high in Barrett's heart as if life bloomed full behind it. For of all the human passions, vengeance is the first, the strongest, and the last.

Light came in between the logs at a place near the door where the earth plaster had fallen away. The hole was small, about a foct from the floor. Barrett pulled himself along the floor to the opening and squinted out. He could see the legs of a horse a little way from the cabin wall. The rider he could not see.

With pistol barrel he pushed cautiously against the hard adobe which filled the four-inch crack between the logs. The two men rode nearer; one tried the door with his foot from the saddle. Barrett heard Findlay order his man to inspect the window and, in his haste to improve the little time he believed to be his, he pushed incautiously against the blocking earth, dislodging a large piece which fell near Findlay's horse, startling the beast to a warning snort.

Findlay dashed away from the door. Peering through his chink, Barrett saw him, leaning and looking in his cautious way, lift his pistol and fire several quick shots into the door. Although he could see Findlay plainly, Barrett discovered that he could not train his pistol through the chink for a shot. At the best he could do little more than cripple the horse, but he fired, gripping, clinging, holding in reeling desperation