"
Fifty feet below, just as Moore rounded the dead cedar, the guns began
again, the spits of red flame lighting up the outlines of the cabin,
and the dark figures of men. It was as though they looked down into
the pit, watching the brewing of some sport of demons--the movements
below them weird, grotesque--rendered horrible by those sudden glares
of light. This firing was all from without, and was unanswered; no
boom of shotgun replied, no muffled crack of revolver. Yet it must
have been for a purpose, for the men crouching against the cliff, their
faces showing ghastly in the flashes of powder, were able to perceive a
massing of figures below. Then the shots ceased, and the butt of the
great log crashed against something with the force of a catapult, and a
yell rolled up through the night.
At last Moore stopped, and waited until Westcott was near enough for
him to whisper in the other's ear.
"There's a drop yere, 'bout ten er twelve feet, I reckon; an' then just
a slope to ther bottom. Don't make no more noise then yer have to, an'
give me a chance ter git out of ther way afore yer let go.
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