of the ridge. He felt half numb as he rounded
the end of the crest where Norris was to have been stationed. To his
stupefaction, the fire fighters had completed their trench and gone!

Where could they be? Probably back at the camp, which he had skirted by
this detour, never dreaming he would find any one but Rosa there.
Well,--he was "outa luck!" Back he went the way he had come, till he
thought it time to climb the ridge. A flare of cook-fire through the
graying dawn showed him where to head, and the huge sun was just slipping
blood-red through the smoke gloom as he took the last log at a leap and
dropped off beside the moving figures.

The men were all there,--as was Ranger Radcliffe, whom the DeHaviland had
evidently returned with fresh supplies. It took but few words to acquaint
them with the situation.

By the time Ted had drank a quart of coffee with his breakfast, he was
able to pull himself together again and lead the posse to the hidden
cave mouth. The Ranger would have to be the one to go, to make the
arrest, and he deputized Ace to help him. That meant leaving Norris to
head the firemen. (It never occurred to any of them that they would not
be right back with Pedro and the Mexicans. The foam-flecked horse Ted
left to Rosa's care.)

The cave mouth accomplished, Radcliffe entered first, with revolver
cocked, though Ace almost trod on his heels. Ted staggered after with a
flaming pine knot flickering in his almost nerveless hand.

The cavern was absolutely empty!

To Pedro, left in the cave mouth to watch the Mexicans, the night had
been the crucial test.

He had been asleep when Ted departed, while the Mexicans had slept within
the cave. He awoke to find the three dark visages bending over him, their
verbal fireworks hissing about his ears. At first "caballo" was all he
could make of it,--(the horse). Then as Sanchez the stout, soared
rhetorically above the others, he gathered that they dared not leave him
and they could not carry him. "El Diablo!" How much simpler to thrust a
dagger between his ribs. "Muerte!--Presto!" But no, wait! For the time
being he would walk between them carrying two extra torches. There must
be another exit to the cave, but could the burros make it with the packs?
Try it they must, for this way their choice lay between the fire fighters
and the flames. The doomed forest still glowed red and black down canyon,
and with the morning light, the wind veered till the smoke assailed