Frank and Snap needed no second bidding, though they felt the six men's eyes following their movements. Their eyes were all they dared to move, for they knew that even while he issued his orders Dick Wharton's eyes never left them for a moment; like the muzzle of his revolver, they rested on them unceasingly. 'There's a Redskin tied up to a tree and gagged behind them rifles,' the voice continued; 'cut his thongs and set him free; give him a rifle and see as it's loaded; pick a rifle for me and see as that's loaded; take all the cartridges as you can get your claws on, and then smash up them other rifles against the handiest bull-pine. Do you mind me?' 'All right, Dick,' answered Snap, his knife already hacking at the leather thongs which bound the captive Indian, a fine-looking fellow, whose eyes glistened, but whose tongue said nothing even when Snap took away the gag. He stretched his arms stiffly, and bent the joints of both legs and arms backwards and forwards once or twice as if uncertain whether or not he had lost the use of them, and when first set free he almost fell from weakness or stiffness--and no wonder, for his bonds had cut deep into his flesh and were dark with his blood. Crash! crash! went the butts of the good rifles against the bull-pine. It seemed a sad waste, but they were Dick's orders and he was in command. 'Are you through there?' cried the voice again. 'Yes,' cried Frank. 'All the rifles broke, mine loaded, the Indian free and armed, and the cartridges pouched?' he inquired again. 'Yes, Dick,' they replied. 'Very well; now keep your rifles ready if they try to rush me,' said Wharton, and then added, to the figures by the fire: 'Now, gentlemen, I'll not detain you any longer; you can skip;' and, dropping his revolver, he turned on his heel and joined the boys. As he did so a report rang out, and then another. The next moment Dick Wharton had wrenched the smoking rifle from the hands of the Indian whom Snap had released; but it was too late, one of the gamblers had a bullet through his skull, and the great hare-lipped chief himself reeled for a moment as the second bullet cut through the muscles of his arm. With a curse, however, he recovered himself, and, dripping with blood, followed his comrades into the forest. 'Why does my brother spare these dogs?' cried the Blackfoot; 'we should have taken six scalps to-night, and my brother has but one.' 'We don't set much store by scalps, exceptin' our own, Warwolf,' replied the cowboy; 'and whites don't care about shootin' men without arms in their hands.'