"That's not for me to do," said Burk hotly. "Oh, I see. You want us to quit, eh?" "Sure. You're the fellows who broke in there over our guard. But if you'll call your fellows off and get out of the house, I'll agree to turn you and the young lady loose. But nothing must be taken from the house." "That seems right generous of you," said Ted, with a sarcastic smile, which Burk didn't see because his head was turned the other way. "It's a darned more than you deserve, but I don't want any more of my fellows shot up." "What do you want me to do?" "Just step out there and holler to your boys to quit firing, and tell them that you're going to quit, and then----" Ted just laughed, and Burk turned upon him with a scowl. At that moment there was a cheer from the direction of the house; then a few scattering shots from the men in the shrubbery. Ted heard the doors of the house open, and the swift patter of running feet. The old Moon Valley yell was in his ears. All the men in the shrubbery had sprung to their feet, and were running wildly about. A man crawled through the bushes--the man with the face he had seen at the window. As he crawled close to Ted the expression of his face was awful to contemplate. Such fiendish, murderous hatred he had never seen in a human countenance before. When he was so close to Ted that he could hear his feverish breathing, the man suddenly thrust forward a pistol until the muzzle was within an inch of Ted's head. Ted struggled to grapple with him, but he had grown so stiff from his wound that he could hardly stir. He was looking death close in the face. The man was just about to pull the trigger when close at hand the major's voice rang out in an exclamation of amazement: "Mowbray! You here?" The man with the pistol sprang to his feet and faced Major Caruthers for a second. Then, with a wild cry of fear, he sprang away through the shrubbery and escaped. CHAPTER XIX. HELEN MOWBRAY'S WILL. By the time one could have counted ten there was not a man of Burk's force in sight, but, on looking down the road where it led to the plain that lay before the mountains, the dust of their retreat hung in the air. "We've got 'em on ther run," said Bud, throwing his hat into the air with a joyous yawp. "Sufferin' tomcats, but them fellers has their nerve, aber nit." Ben and the major had carried Ted into the house, and the major, who was a good surgeon, had Ted's coat off and was examining his wound. When the shot had been fired through the door at him the ball had been deflected by a piece of iron, and, instead of penetrating his heart, as it surely would have done otherwise, it struck a rib and ran around toward the back, coming out near the spine, and, although an extremely painful wound, it was not at all serious.