He smiled at her. "Get back in there," he snapped to the tall man who had been her captor. The man quailed in fright and backed, hands still raised, into the room where Snippets had been a prisoner. "Come on, kid," said Allen. "We got to get out of here." The two grays were waiting close to the house. A rifle hung on Honey Boy's saddle. "Do yuh think Princess will know yuh?" Allen asked. Snippets placed her fingers to her lips and whistled. Princess cocked her ears, then, followed by her mate, dashed toward the girl. Snippets, undismayed by the snapping teeth, rubbed the mare's soft muzzle. "Hop on her, kid, 'cause those gents will be tearin' mad," he urged. After they were mounted, Snippets glanced about in bewildered recognition of the landscape. "Why, this is the Bar X--uncle's ranch!" she gasped. "What does it mean?" Allen hesitated. "Reckon you'll learn some time, so I might as well tell yuh, kid, that Ace Cutts is a bad actor." She thought of her uncle, of his fondness for the boy, and grew silent. Side by side they rode toward town in the bright morning sunlight. * * * * * Five riders approached out of a draw to the north of the lava fields. They were heading fast for the Bar X Ranch. Anderson, their leader, jerked his horse to a sudden, sliding stop. He pointed to the two figures on a smooth meadow a mile before them. "Who the hell is that clown there?" he cried. Quick suspicion fired the Yuma Kid. "Two grays!" he rasped. Baldy's thin lips drew back in a toothless snarl. "The Wolf!" "He tricked us!" As Anderson made the admission, his face grew rigid, and the veins on the back of his neck expanded. The other two riders were Mexicans, José and Pedro Gonzalez, two of the Toad's men. Both were killers. They were used on raids where it was bad policy to leave any survivors. "_Madre de Dios!_" José swore. "He has the girl!" "We hang if----" his brother began. "We don't stop him," Anderson snapped. He gave his orders rapidly. The Mexicans swung their horses to cut in behind Allen, while Anderson, Baldy, and the Yuma Kid turned to their right to head him off. Anderson shouted with exultation when he saw Ace Cutts and several riders top the rise on the farther side of the valley. They had Allen in a trap. Bill Anderson and the other two were within a half mile of Allen before he saw them. At a glance he understood that they would head him off. He grinned confidently at Snippets. "Kid, we're in a jam. Don't try tuh guide Princess, she savvies how tuh follow," he called cheerfully. Allen swung Honey Boy straight up the northern rise toward several mushroomlike buttes. Princess followed some fifteen yards in the rear. He was within a few hundred yards of the crest when Ace Cutts and his men topped the rise. Ace shouted, and three of his men threw themselves off their horses and began to fire, while he and two other men continued to race along the crest.