He was sleeping thus one afternoon, when he was awakened by his shoulder being violently shaken. He opened his eyes and reached for his gun in a moment. Red Cloud, who was evidently in a state of great excitement, although he repressed outward signs of it with Indian stoicism, pointed to an arrow that was still quivering in the wall of their little shelter above his head. “The Cave Dwellers! The Cave Dwellers!” he cried, and he pointed toward a clump of trees about fifty yards from their hut. Glancing thither, Buffalo Bill saw two squat, deformed, misshapen creatures who looked more like big apes than men. They were almost black in color, and their arms and legs were bowed like those of a gorilla. As he watched them they danced to and fro and gave vent to several hideous yells, making the most hideous grimaces at the same time. Buffalo Bill had heard of these strange creatures before, but he had never imagined they could look so demoniac and inhuman. After a few seconds one of the savages leaped forward, fitted an arrow to the bow which he carried in his left hand, and was about to pull the string. Before he could do so Buffalo Bill drew a quick bead on him and shot him dead. The other Indian gave a wail of dismay, looked at his slain companion for a moment in a dazed way, and then promptly took to his heels and fled through the trees. The border king did not attempt to pursue him, for he thought it possible that some other of his comrades might be lurking about, and it would therefore be dangerous to leave his patient. “It was a lucky shot, brother,” said Red Cloud. “The arrows of the Cave Dwellers are almost always poisoned, and the slightest scratch with one of them is likely to kill a man. If the first arrow they fired had struck me, I should now be roaming the happy hunting grounds of the Great Manitou.” “Who are they, and why did they attack us?” asked Buffalo Bill, after he had satisfied himself that the savage he had shot was really dead. “They are the Cave Dwellers,” replied the Indian, “and they attacked us because they have a mortal feud with my tribe, and especially with myself. It is a long story, brother, but it were well that you should know it.” “Let me get rid of the body first,” remarked Buffalo Bill. “If I leave it here, the coyotes and buzzards will come around pretty soon and trouble us. See! they are beginning to circle already.” He pointed overhead, where several vultures were circling in whirls that approached constantly nearer to the ground. With his strong, broad-bladed bowie knife, the scout hollowed out a grave a few feet deep in the loose, sandy earth, and placed the body of the dead savage in it. Over the shoveled-in earth he rolled a number of heavy stones, so that the coyotes would be unable to dig up the body.