For the man suddenly huddled down and rolled over on
his side.
His comrades appeared to take warning by this example. The men at
both ends of the crescent fell back, and for a minute the girl's
heart leaped with the hope that they were about to abandon the
siege. Apparently the man in the scarlet kerchief had no such
expectation. He deserted his position behind the pine and ran
back, crouching low in the brush, to another little clump of
trees closer to the bluff. The reason for this was at first not
apparent to her, but she understood presently when the men who
had fallen back behind the rolling hillocks appeared again well
in to the edge of the bluff. Only by his timely retreat had the
man saved himself from being outflanked.
It was very plain that the attackers meant to take their time to
finish him in perfect safety. He was surrounded on every side by
a cordon of rifles, except where the bare face of the butte hung
down behind him. To attempt to scale it would have been to expose
himself as a mark for every gun to certain death.
It was now that she heard the man who seemed to be directing the
attack call out to another on his right. She was too far to make
out the words, but their effect was clear to her.
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