"Stop where you are, Snyder," said Saxton, "or I'll shoot. I'm John Saxton; you may remember me." He spoke in steady, even tones. The lantern, rolling down the stairway, startled the horses, which stamped restlessly on the floor. The wind whistled dismally outside. He heard Snyder, as he assumed the man to be, cautiously feeling his way toward the staircase. "You may as well stop there," Saxton said, without moving, and holding the boy to the floor with his left hand. He spoke in sharp, even tones. "It's all right, Grant," he added in the same key to the boy, who was crying with fright. "Stay where you are. The house is surrounded, Snyder," he went on. "You may as well give in." The man said nothing. He had found the stairway. Suddenly a revolver flashed and cracked, and the man went leaping down the stairs. The ball whistled over Saxton's head, and the boy clutched him about the legs. A bit of plaster, shaken loose by the bullet, fell from the ceiling. The noise of the revolver roared through the house. "It's all right, Grant," Saxton said again. The retreating man slipped and fell at the landing, midway of the stairs, and as he stumbled to his feet Saxton ran back into the room from which the fellow had emerged. He threw up the window with a crash and shouted to the men in the darkness below: "He's coming! Get out of the way and let him go! The boy's all right!" He hurried back into the hall where he had left Grant, who crouched moaning in the dark. "You stay here a minute, Grant. They won't get you again," he called as he ran down the steps. One of the horses below was snorting with fright and making a great clatter with its hoofs. From the sound Saxton knew that the fleeing man was trying to mount, and as he plunged down the last half of the stairway, the horse broke through the door with the man on his back. "Let him go, Warry," yelled Saxton with all his lungs. The horse was already across the threshold at a leap, his rider bending low over the animal's neck to avoid the top of the door. Raridan ran forward, taking his bearings by sounds. "Stop!" he shouted. "Come on, Wheaton!" Wheaton was running toward him at the top of his speed; Raridan sprang in front of the horse and grabbed at the throat-latch of its bridle. The horse, surprised, and terrified by the noise, and feeling the rider digging his heels into his sides, reared, carrying Warry off his feet. "Let go, you fool," screamed the rider. "Let go, I say!" "Let him alone," cried Wheaton, now close at hand; but Raridan still held to the strap at the throat of the plunging horse.