Nor was there any outcry in the room. At first the girl
had not seen, her back being to the door. Nor had old man Adams, his red
rimmed eyes being on the girl. They turned together. The old man's jaw
dropped; the girl's eyes widened, rather to a lively interest, it would
seem, than to alarm. One had but to sit tight at times like this and
obey orders....
The intruder's eyes were everywhere. His chief concern, however, from
the start appeared to be Hap Smith. The stage driver's hand had gone to
the butt of his revolver and now rested there. The muzzle of the short
barrelled shotgun made a short quick arc and came to bear on Hap Smith.
Slowly his fingers dropped from his belt.
Bert Stone, a quick eyed little man from Barstow's Springs, whipped out
a revolver from its hidden place on his person and fired. But he had
been over hasty and the man in the doorway had seen the gesture. The
roar of the shotgun there in the house sounded like that of a cannon;
the smoke lifted and spread and swirled in the draft. Bert Stone went
down with a scream of pain as a load of buckshot flung him about and
half tore off his outer arm. Only the fact that Stone, in firing, had
wisely thrown his body a little to the side, saved the head upon his
body.
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