her amazement the first move he made was to pull the rock seal back over the opening. The two were instantly invisible to each other in the inky darkness.
Then the dazzling beam of, an electric torch flared into Doris’s face.
“So kind of you to wait for me,” Moon mocked. “Now we shall have a pleasant evening, I am sure.”
He set the electric lantern on a keg, and as his back was momentarily turned, Doris snatched up the steel bar and concealed it behind her, rising to her feet at the same time.
“Has the cat got your tongue, little girl?” Moon asked with a leer.
Doris did not deign to reply, but stared at the evil countenance of the crook with level, unwavering gaze. Moon was far from feeling the self-confidence he exhibited.
He had heard Dave’s call to Doris, and, sure that a searching party was approaching, had rolled the rock aside to leap into the cave when Doris, in her doubt, had cried out Dave’s name.
Torn by uncertainty, the crook had rolled the stone back into place, and then, convinced that there was more safety in concealment, had carried out his original plans of settling with Doris.
“Don’t be afraid to speak,” he jeered. “No one can overhear us. You could scream until Christmas, and no one could hear you if he were sitting on the rock over my head.”
Still Doris gave no reply. Her silence nettled Moon.
To hide his uncertainty the evil-doer lit a cigarette, and Doris saw that the hand that held the match trembled so he could scarcely make flame and tobacco meet.
“So Mr. Moon is nervous, too,” she thought, new courage surging through her.
Her hands gripped more firmly the steel bar behind her.
Moon perched himself on a barrel, crossed his legs jauntily, and spoke again:
“Did anybody ever tell you you were a remarkably beautiful young woman?”
Doris did not show by the quiver of an eyejid that she had heard him.
“Beautiful or not,” Moon went on, a mirthless smile twisting his lips, “you are not a help to me in my business.
“You take up too much space down here, so I will have to move you to other quarters. I am going to give you your chance to be reasonable. Will you give me a promise?”
Doris stared stonily.
“As a matter of necessity I will have to blindfold and gag you,” Moon went on. “You can take your choice of submitting gracefully or submitting by force, in which case some of that beauty may be marred.”
The man left his seat, and without turning his back upon the girl, retreated in the cave to a packing box, in which he groped.
His hand emerged with a coil of fibrous rope, of the sort woven by the natives of the Southwest from the leaf-fiber of yucca palm. Pliable yet tremendously strong, this kind of rope has the texture of hemp dipped in glue and ground glass and will cut through horse-hide.
“I have a handkerchief which will serve as a blindfold,” Moon said, “thus enabling me to use your own for the gag. I am sorry I cannot trust you to come with me minus these precautions.”
Doris still appeared as if stricken deaf and dumb. Her immobility seemed to enrage the crook.
“I’ll fix you so you’ll want to open that mouth of yours but won’t be able to,” he snarled, as rage crimsoned his face and made the veins stand out on his forehead.
Knotting a noose in one end of the rope, Moon, desperately angry, advanced slowly upon Doris who still stood, erect and calm now, her hands behind her.
The girl, however, was measuring the decreasing distance between the desperado and herself.
“Now, then, you lit—”
Moon did not finish his sentence, uttered as he made a leap for Doris. In that instant Doris quickly brought the sharp steel bar from behind her, and unsuspectingly the ugly man dashed into it with full force.
With a choking cry, half gasp, half gurgle, he toppled to the floor and rolled over on his back, the breath knocked from his body.
Doris, now empty-handed, leaped for the mouth of the cave. With the strength born of desperation she shoved against the boulder that barred her way. It was immovable. Undoubtedly some secret had to be known to swing the stone on its balance.
Frantically Doris pushed, first at one corner, then at another. Over her shoulder she saw Moon roll over, drag himself to hands and knees and then, clutching at the wall for support, draw himself shakily to his feet.
At that self-same instant Doris felt the rock move above her hands. She threw her last ounce of strength into one desperate lunge, and lost her balance as the stone miraculously seemed to rise of its own accord.
“Hoorah!”
Doris, dazed, could not believe that she had actually heard the cheer from above.
Then, one after the other, three stalwart figures dropped into the cave.
“Doris! Where are you?”
“Dave! Here I am!”
Impulsively the youth turned and threw a protecting arm around Doris, who slumped for an instant against the friendly security of his shoulder. Yet their eyes were upon Henry Moon, who had staggered back into the darkest recess of the cave.
“Up with your hands!”
The sharp command came from Ben Corlies, whose gun was leveled at the unscrupulous thief.
The third figure was a stranger to Doris. A wizened face set above broad but bowed shoulders.
“Ye will throw dust in my hoss’s face, eh?” the new ally taunted the cornered Moon.
“I guess the game is up,” Moon spoke from the shadows. “I’ll come along peaceably, but let me light a cigarette first.”
“I guess there’s no harm in that,” Ben admitted, advancing toward Moon with leveled gun.
Doris saw the desperation of a cornered rat in Moon’s eyes, and instinct made her cry out:
“Don’t let him do it, Ben! It may be a trick!”
Snarling, Moon jerked out a box of matches and broke the container in his eagerness to strike a light.
“Hey, where’s your smoke?” Ben demanded.
Doris leaped forward, brushing the dumbfounded Ben aside, and dashed matches and box from Moon’s grasp.
With a cry of mad fury the man flew at her throat, but Dave’s fist shot over Doris’s shoulder and sent Moon’s head backward with a blow on the chin.
“Good, here’s some rope,” Dave panted, as he snatched up the coil with which Moon had planned to bind
