Slowly the moments dragged away, until Major Conrad began to nod with sleep. Then, feeling anxious about the river front, Percy la Clyde cautiously crept there and reconnoitered. At first he believed all quiet and safe, but his quick eye soon caught sight of a dark mass upon the water. Closely he watched it, and he saw it slowly moving down upon the point near which he stood. Bounding into the ravine, he startled Howard Lawrence, who still remained by the side of Sibyl, with the words: “Be good enough to request Major Conrad to send me thirty men to this point; and ask him to create no alarm.” Howard Lawrence was off at once to obey the order, although he did not like the tone in which the order was given; still, he felt he had been negligent of his duty, and wished to repair it all in his power. Before five minutes had passed, the men arrived, headed by Major Conrad. As they came up, Captain la Clyde remarked quietly: “We are to be attacked by water, it seems; but we have greatly the advantage; so I will only keep my troopers with me, major, and you can return with the remainder of the men, as the attack will doubtless be made at more than this point. And, major, as there is no need of a sentinel here now, perhaps you can find some other duty for Mr. Lawrence.” Major Conrad and his men returned to their post, and Captain la Clyde was about to give the order to fire, when all were startled by the discharge of the weapons of the Branded Brotherhood, which leveled so many of the Dog Soldiers to the ground. “By Heaven, we have friends near, when we little dreamed of it!” La Clyde exclaimed, when he heard the firing. “Ha, it must be the scout, who has kept his word. Ready, men; fire!” At the order of the young officer the troopers poured in a rapid fire with their repeating rifles. Thus Red Dick and his men found themselves under two fires, and in dismay they broke and rushed for safety into the river, as soon as the Indian warrior arrived with the news of the massacre of their companions. Unable to account for the turn in their favor, or why, if friends had come, they did not make themselves known, Captain la Clyde was about to go outside the fortifications for the purpose of discovery, when he observed a dark form crawling toward the water. Springing down the embankment, he seized this man in his powerful arms, and dragged him back. It was an Indian warrior, with a broken leg and otherwise wounded. Speaking the Sioux tongue fluently, the captain soon learned of him that Ricardo and his Branded Brotherhood were surrounding his encampment, and the treachery of the outlaw chief toward his red allies was also revealed. “Well, it is dog eat dog, that’s certain. Now that we have Ricardo and his band to fight, we must indeed defend more than our lives.” And Percy la Clyde’s brow grew dark with dread, for he knew the desperate courage of the Branded Brotherhood, and the awful fate that would fall upon Sibyl and the others, if taken.