men vanished behind the bulge of lava.
Then Yaqui deliberately backed away from his position. He made no
effort to run or hide. Evidently he watched cautiously for signs of
pursuers in the ruts and behind the choyas. Presently he turned and
came straight toward the position of the rangers, sheered off perhaps a
hundred paces below it, and disappeared in a crevice. Plainly his
intention was to draw pursuers within rifle shot.

"Shore, Jim, you had your wish. Somethin' come off," said Ladd. "An'
I'm sayin' thank God for the Yaqui! That Papago 'd have ruined us.
Even so, mebbe he's told Rojas more'n enough to make us sweat blood."

"He had a chance to kill Rojas," cried out the drawn-faced, passionate
Thorne. "He didn't take it!... He didn't take it!"

Only Ladd appeared to be able to answer the cavalryman's poignant cry.

"Listen, son," he said, and his voice rang. "We-all know how you feel.
An' if I'd had that one shot never in the world could I have picked the
Papago guide. I'd have had to kill Rojas. That's the white man of it.
But Yaqui was right. Only an Indian could have done it. You can
gamble the Papago alive meant slim chance for us. Because he'd led
straight to where Mercedes is hidden, an' then we'd have left cover to
fight it out... When you come to think of the Yaqui's hate for
Greasers, when you just seen him pass up a shot at one--well, I don't
know how to say what I mean, but damn me, my som-brer-ro is off to the
Indian!"

"I reckon so, an' I reckon the ball's opened," rejoined Lash, and now
that former nervous impatience so unnatural to him was as if it had
never been. He was smilingly cool, and his voice had almost a
caressing note. He tapped the breech of his Winchester with a sinewy
brown hand, and he did not appear to be addressing any one in
particular. "Yaqui's opened the ball. Look up your pardners there,
gents, an' get ready to dance."

Another wait set in then, and judging by the more direct rays of the
sun and a receding of the little shadows cast by the choyas, Gale was
of the opinion that it was a long wait. But it seemed short. The four
men were lying under the bank of a half circular hole in the lava. It
was notched and cracked, and its rim was fringed by choyas. It sloped
down and opened to an unobstructed view of the crater. Gale had the
upper position, fartherest to the right, and therefore was best
shielded from possible fire from the higher ridges of the rim,