"There goes Hank Stiger! He was going to blow up the cabin with our keg of gunpowder." "Can it be possible! I'll stop him." Stover ran outside. "Stop, Hank Stiger, or you're a dead man!" he called out, loudly. But the half-breed was now running like a deer and paid no attention to the words. Taking hasty but careful aim at Stiger's legs, Poke Stover pulled the trigger of his gun. The report, which awakened all of the others, was followed by a scream of pain from the half-breed, who went a step or two more and then sank in a heap. "What does this mean?" demanded Amos Radbury, as he, too, seized his gun. "Are we attacked by Indians?" "No, we were attacked by Hank Stiger," answered Dan, and pointed to the keg of powder. "My powder! What was he going to do with that?" "Blow us all sky-high." "And you saw him?" "Yes, I caught him in the act of lighting the fuse lying there." "But how came you to be up?" "I was restless,--thinking about the keg and other things." "It must have been an act of Providence," murmured Amos Radbury. "Who fired the shot?" "Poke Stover. He has gone after Stiger," concluded Dan. All ran out of the cabin, and found the frontiersman and the half-breed at the edge of the clearing. Hank Stiger had been struck in the knee and was evidently suffering great pain, for after screaming for awhile he fell back in a dead faint. Stover and Pompey were for leaving him where he had fallen, but neither Amos Radbury nor his sons had the heart to do this, and in the end the half-breed was carried to the cattle shed and put in the corner from whence he had removed the powder. All were anxious to question him about his actions, but the wounded man was in no condition to talk. "After this I'll put this powder in a safer place," said Mr. Radbury, and stored it in a corner of the dugout, under the living-room. Hank Stiger's wound was dressed, and then Pompey was set to watch him for the remainder of the night. The negro was given a pistol and was instructed to discharge it at the first intimation of danger of any kind. But the balance of the night passed quietly, and toward morning Dan got into a sound sleep, from which he did not awaken until long after the others were up. After breakfast Amos Radbury started to question Hank Stiger. He found the half-breed resting easily, but in a sullen mood. At first he utterly refused to talk. "Very well," said Mr. Radbury. "If you won't talk, neither shall you eat nor drink." "Then take me back to the Gonzales lockup," muttered Stiger. "We will,--when we have the time. At present we have other matters to attend to." Left once more in charge of Pompey, the half-breed flew into a rage and muttered all sorts of imprecations against those who had outwitted him. Then, as the day wore on, he calmed down, and tried to bribe the coloured man into giving him something to eat and to drink. Pompey was obdurate. "Can't do it, nohow," he said. "It's ag'in Mars' Radbury's ordahs, sah."