CHAPTER XIX.

KILLED BY THE STEAM HORSE.

When Frank Reade fell from his seat to the ground, stricken by the bullets fired at him by the enemy, he lay perfectly motionless upon the hard plain, and any one would have supposed him dead.

Such, however, was not the case, for he had only been knocked off his balance in consequence of the leaden bullets striking with their terrific force against his head-piece.

The well-made metal covering saved his life, but it could not help to preserve his balance.

Down he went, and when he got down he stopped there, for his wind went as soon as he struck the ground, and he lay there insensible.

Barney was fighting like a tiger just let loose.

“Hooroo!” he would shriek, meeting an Indian warwhoop with a stentorian Irish cry not a whit less shrill or powerful than the redskins’. “What an illigant country, where they kape foighting for the fun o’ the thing, do ye moind. Och, sure, there’s not the hate of it in the wide, wide worruld, so there ain’t. Look at this, now; that’s a Donegal clip I picked up from Patsy Gagen; he was the son-in-law of me eldest sister’s father’s cousin, and that made him a distant relation to myself, do ye moind; and, be the powers, he taught me this same bit of a twist that they call the Donegal smasher. There, ye have it agin; shure.”

Jared Dwight had gone to work in the savage style.

Stabbing with the knife seemed more suited to his taste just then than did shooting with the pistol, and so he allowed his revolver to remain in his belt while he kept thrusting at his foes in the most cold-blooded and vindictive style.

He seldom drew his revolver, except to shoot down one of the enemy who was getting the best of a friend, and then only when the pair were altogether out of his reach.

It seemed to be no small gratification for him to scour his knife on the ribs of his enemies, and certainly he had plenty of such fun.

The besieged party had fought bravely for their wives and little ones, and their strong blows had told fearfully even against the superior numbers brought to bear against them.

They were led on by a young man of not more than thirty, a tall, nobly-formed Hercules, who walked straight among his foes with an awful battle smile on his lips, and who cut down strong men with magnificent sweeping blows of his heavy rifle.

This was Mustang Max, one of the most skillful guides and worst redskin haters on the plains.

He fought so coolly and easily that it appeared like a pastime to him, and wherever he went with that long swinging rifle and deadly smile the Indians seemed struck with a panic, and would lose no time in gaining another part of the field.

They seemed to fear him far more than even Jared Dwight, although the latter was the more destructive foe.

Pistols cracked, bullets went whistling in the air, knives spun over and over in the various lights streaming up in columns from the wagon attached to the Steam Horse, tomahawks clashed against rifle butts, savage oaths were met by savage yells, and the life-blood of the contending factions rapidly stained the field.

And through it all Frank Reade lay under the wagon senseless, his head just a few inches back of the hind hoofs of the Steam Horse.

Some of the men who had shot at him, supposing him to be dead, wished to secure the wonderful suit in which he was habited.

Three of them had shot at him, three white men, and one of them now called to the others:

“Go for the boy. If he’s dead we want his suit, and if he’s only wounded, we want his body. We can wipe this crowd out easy enough.”

“Lead on,” cried the other two, and the trio fairly fought their way out from the thickest of the battle, and made a dash for the wagon.

Barney Shea did good service.

Once in his life he had thrown a knife, and had plugged his enemy fairly in the back.

This gave him the idea that he was a straight shot, so when he saw those three chaps making for the wagon, he picked up a heavy tomahawk and hurled it at them.

He didn’t make a remarkably accurate throw this time, but it resulted better by far than he had expected.

It, the tomahawk, struck heavily upon one of the reins running to the nostrils of the Steam Horse, and like lightning up came one fore foot, and also one of the hind feet.

As has already been explained, the power was equally divided in the Steam Horse’s nose to allow of his being steered by the application of a well-known principle discovered in human limbs, and when the tomahawk struck with immense force against one rein it let on great power in one side only of the iron monster, and away he went in a big circle, tearing round and constantly narrowing the immense ring from the fact that the ground he ran on was slightly uneven.

His flying fore foot struck down one of the men as the rascal was about to creep upon the unconscious young inventor.

The iron spikes crashed through the villain’s brain, stretching him dead upon the plain, killed by the wonderful Steam Horse.

Away tore the iron fiend through the crowded ranks, and both sides were threatened with death.

“Back to the rocks!” roared Jared Dwight, just as Frank Reade picked himself up from the ground and gazed wonderingly around him. “Keep inside the pass.”

The emigrants obeyed, but three of their number were knocked down before they could elude the horse.

The Indians ran, yelling and shrieking, from the spot, scared to death by the odd affair; for without a driver on the seat, it appeared as though the iron steed knew what he was doing when he struck them down with his spiked hoofs.

The white outlaws were no more inclined to stop than their red allies, for their heads were threatened, and they could not strike back with effect at this odd enemy.

They hastily caught what horses they could in a pell-mell sort of manner, and, partly mounted and partly on foot, they dashed away.

Frank Reade stood for a moment in amazement, contemplating the destructive circular course of his invention, and then he made a jump for the madly tearing animal.

He knew that if the thing was to be stopped, he would have to do it.

He leaped up into the wagon, although it was an effort for him to do so, clad as he was in steel, and climbing over the seat, he seized the reins.

In a moment he had the horse fully under control, and then he drove him up to the mouth of the pass.

The fight was over.

The victory had not been for either side, but the emigrants could now leave the terrible pass which had caught them as a trap catches a mouse.

Frank and Jared Dwight marched in silence over the field, with the same idea in their heads, and after looking at the wounded and dead, they both cried:

“Where’s Barney Shea?”