"Out through the window, one by one, with your hands up and your guns down," shouted Struve; "or I start in. Which is it, boys?"
There was a scramble to obey, the several men who had taken no part leading the way. As they went out their forms were for a moment clearly outlined, then swallowed up in the outer darkness. At Struve's command they lined up against the wall, watched over by the muzzle of his shotgun. Antone, crying out that he was coming, followed. Elmer Page, sick and dizzy, was at Antone's heels.
Tom Cutter had gathered up some dry grass, and with that and a chance-found bit of wood started a blaze near the second window; in its wavering, uncertain light the faces of the men stood out whitely.
"Galloway is not here yet," he snapped. And, lifting his voice: "Come on, Galloway."
A crowd had gathered in the street, asking questions that went unanswered. Other hands added fuel to Cutter's fire. The increasing light at last penetrated the blackness filling the barroom.
"Come out, Galloway," said Struve coldly. "I've got you covered."
Since things were bad enough as they were, and he had no desire to make them worse and saw no opportunity to better them, Jim Galloway, his hand nursing a bleeding shoulder, stumbled awkwardly through the opening.
"Is that all of 'em, Roddy?" called Cutter. Norton didn't answer. The deputy called again. Then, while the crowd surged about door and window. Cutter came in, a revolver in his right hand, a torch of a burning fagot in his left, held high.
Vidal Nuñez was dead; not from a blow upon the head, but from a chance bullet through the heart after he had fallen. Kid Rickard, his sullen eyes wide with their pain, lay half under a poker table. Lying across the body of Nuñez, as though still guarding his prisoner, was the quiet form of Rod Norton, his face bloodlessly white save for the smear of blood which had run from the wound hidden by the close-cropped, black hair.
Ignacio Chavez, waiting to ask no questions, had raced away through the darkness to beat out a wild alarm upon his bells. Later he would learn how many were dead and would set the Captain mourning. But already had San Juan poured out her handful of citizens upon the street.