dropping their rifles and revolvers onto the porch, and walking slowly to the well. At that point, Charley and I stood up and began striding toward the house. I signaled Ignacio to come down from his perch in the hayloft. I kept my eyes and Winchester on the men who had now reached the well.

With about another hundred feet to go, I suddenly got a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach and stopped dead in my tracks.

"What's wrong?" Charley asked.

Before I could answer, I heard the sharp crack of a rifle being fired. Then darkness.

* * *

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