The Girl from Hong-Kong: A Story of Adventure Under Five Suns — page 338: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

382 THE GIRL FROM HONG-KONG. her to do this, for ‘she longs to be at Terry’s side, sharing . his danger-: In good ime Sandy lets them hear from him. CHAPTER XXXIX. THE ADVENTURES OF A NIGHT. Those above have worked all this whilé, and arrived at.the point where a burning match is to be applied. to the wire-bound ball. ‘Sandy, crouching across the way, understands that the time has come for him to join in the game, and imme- diately opens his batteries. _ Such a smashing time he has of it—the shots. follow in quick succession, and«if Sandy’s accuracy could be ~ gauged by the rapidity with which he rattles. out the con-_ tents of his six-shaoter, the fellows on the ledge above ‘ would stand a poor show. Perhaps most of, the leaden messengers do fly a trifle wild, but: by rare good luck the first. one has found its billet, and the man who holds the match drops it upon the infammablexball, which flames up on the ledge. - The frantic efforts of those two wretches, dancing there in midair, to avoid the bullets that keep - rattling around them, flattening against the face of the rocks, may be ludicrous enough in the opinion of an onlooker, but it is a serious affair with them. Finally they dash recklessly away along the narrow ledge in the way they came, and, as Sandy has by this time quite exhausted the chambers of his gun, he allows therm to escape without further damage. It is glory enough for him to realize that he has ac- complished his work, and to see the threatening bundle of fire consuming itself in an impotent way up on the otherwise abandoned ledge. Just about this time Sandy becomes aware of the fact that the affair is not wholly one-sided, for a bullet chips a piece out of the rock behind him, and unless h e makes