The only fear he had was lest the enemy should withdraw--even now, at this ultimate moment, when everything was shaping so well for a settlement of old scores, and forces were, as he considered it, so evenly balanced. The pursuers were, indeed, nearly three to one, but the position was against them. It would be a tremendous pity if such an opportunity were allowed to slip. Sooner than let that happen he would venture much. Inch by inch, in the dark, he edged noiselessly away from the others towards the barricade. He knelt down and crept between the hind wheels of the teléga and the rock wall. He craned his head round the corner, and became instantly aware of a similar approach from the other side. He waited in joyful suspense. He held his breath. His rifle barrel slipped cautiously through his left hand, till his right hand was on the lock. There was a shuffling of many feet outside, a click of the tongue such as one uses to start a horse, and Blok opened fire. A guttural curse and a stumble, the crash of many rifles, the splintering of wood, the spat of bullets on rock, and the bend of the cleft blazed fitfully in the intermittent flashes. But Blok lay still and fired no more. He had disobeyed orders and he had paid the price. Half-a-dozen dark figures slipped in round the end of the teléga, and some came out round the end of the tarantas, and some from underneath it, and some stood and fired over it. Other hands seized the teléga and slewed it round into the roadway to widen the approach. But, as the dark figures emerged from the darkness of the tarantas, the three defenders opened fire, with revolvers and rifle, and man after man went down. The cleft boiled like a mighty pot in the light of the continuous flashes. It was full of wreathing smoke and vicious cracklings and wild-flying lead. That first shot from beneath the teléga had told Palma Blok's story. He curtly bade the others grimp to the rock, but himself stood out in the narrow way and shot down man after man as they issued round, or crept from under, the tarantas. One might almost have thought him careless of his life. When his revolver was empty, and still they came, he ran in and used the butt on any head or face that offered. Rimof's Berdan rang out alongside Pavlof as fast as he could snap in the cartridges. But the besieger's bullets were two to one in spite of casualties, and presently Pavlof heard the clang of a rifle as it fell on the rocky way at his feet, and then the sprawling fall of a man. He was bending to him, when, in the fitful glare in front, he saw Palma fall in a heap also, and he ran forward to help him. The men behind the tarantas gave a hoarse shout, and the cleft blazed and boiled again. Pavlof felt a bullet rip through his coat. Another stung through his shoulder like the searing of a hot iron, and spun him round and dropped him on Palma's body.