with the whine and drone of bullets.

"Hold-ups, by the 'tarnal," yelled the driver, accompanying his words
with a whirl of oaths. "Down behind the coach, Sam!" addressing the
guard, who always rode beside him on the box with loaded rifle; "we'll
stand 'em off, or I'm a greaser."

The guard leaped down behind the coach at the same moment that Bert and
Dick and Tom made for the same shelter. There were only two passengers
in the coach, and they, pale of face and with chattering teeth, joined
the little group.

"Them shots came from that bunch of chaparral over there," said Buck,
"but it's an almighty queer way for road agents to go about a job. They
ginerally----"

"Injuns!" shouted the guard, who had been peering cautiously around the
end of the coach. "Injuns, by the Lord Harry, shoot me if they ain't!"

A thrill passed over the three comrades, and they looked warily forth in
the direction in which the guard had pointed. Sure enough, over the top
of the chapparal they could discern a number of hideously painted faces
surmounted by tufts of eagle feathers. The guard, recovering from his
first paralysis of astonishment, took careful aim at one of them and
pulled the trigger. A yell of pain followed the report of his rifle, and
a savage shout went up from the band of redskins. They answered with a
volley that bored through the sides of the coach, and narrowly missed
several of the little group gathered behind it.

"We got to turn the coach over," exclaimed Buck, "the top an' floor's a