"Pipe it into 'em, Jim," roared Buck. "You're gettin' home every shot. Hark at 'em squealin'." The barricade had now come to a standstill, and it trembled all over every time that it was struck by the heavy bullet travelling at terrific speed at so short a range. "Fire low, Jim," cried Jack, "they have stopped and are crouching at the foot of the palisade, I know." Jim fired low, and his shot was answered by a fresh outburst of yells of pain and rage. Suddenly the palisade began to waver, then it slowly fell over, as a stream of blue-clothed figures darted from its insufficient shelter. The dacoits did not make either for the door of the hut nor for the jungle they had left. The pagoda was the nearest cover to them, and they raced for it with all their speed, the quick-firing Mannlichers scourging them with a whistling shower of lead as they flew. When the last Kachin who could run had disappeared behind the building, the comrades checked their fire and looked at each other with joyful eyes. Jim slapped the breech of the eight-bore exultantly. "It sent every bullet through their shield like a cannon!" he cried. "Lucky I put it in; they'd have got up to the door all right if it hadn't stopped 'em." "They would, indeed, Jim," replied Jack, "and it would have been all over with us then." "Sure thing," agreed Buck. "We should ha' hit the long trail in short order." "What's the next move?" cried Jack. "Hard to say," replied Jim. "We can do nothing but watch 'em." Watch them they did. The three comrades kept a steady look-out, but the sun went down, and the swift dark of the tropics fell over jungle and clearing, and the dacoits had given no further sign of their presence. The approach of night filled the besieged with the greatest uneasiness. There was no moon to light the early hours of the darkness, and in the deep gloom the dacoits could creep upon them unseen and swarm over them by sheer force of numbers. But just as dusk fell, Me Dain began to drag down a number of planks and posts from aloft. This was the fruit of his hacking away with the heavy _dah_. He had cut loose enough timber to make a very useful barrier at the open doorway, and he and Jim made the strongest barricade they could while the others kept watch. When night fell they kept their places, every ear strained to catch the faintest sound. They had only to watch one side of the ground floor where they stood. Three of the walls were solid and very strongly built; the fourth was pierced by the windows and the door, and here they had taken their stand from the first. About two hours after dark, Me Dain came to the head of the stairs leading to the next floor. He had been stationed there to move from one to the other of the upper windows and keep strict watch all round. "Come here now," said Me Dain. "I'll go," murmured Jack, and he groped his way across the floor to the foot of the wooden steps. Up he went, and found the Burman waiting for him at the top.