"Don't worry none, Mr. Hogg. If he bats an eye, I'll drop him," Allen said confidently. Sam Hogg advanced to meet Cupid Dart, and they talked for several minutes. When Sam returned to Powers and Allen, after the outlaw reentered the fortress, his face was white and drawn. "There's hell to pay!" he exclaimed. "They has the judge in there with 'em. And unless we gives up Pete Cable, they promises to hang him high and proper." "But we can't do that, 'cause Pete Cable is now in the State Prison, an' they wouldn't give him to us, unless the judge signed an order," Tom Powers sputtered. "And the judge won't sign nothin'," Allen said. "Yea. That damn fake dude tells me, the judge refuses flat. They want us to sorta persuade him," Sam Hogg added. "I figures yuh might as well try and persuade a mountain." Allen shook his head. "Does he savvy we got Snippets?" "Yep. He heard 'em talkin' and knows we got her, otherwise they might have him sign the paper by using her," Sam Hogg said. "Damn 'em! If they touches the judge, we'll stick here until we starves 'em out," Powers declared wrathfully. "Not any. Yuh savvy we are in Mexico? He tells me the soldiers is comin' along, 'cause they sent for 'em. To-morrow they'll dust in here and chase us away," Sam Hogg explained. The sheriff and the cattleman entered into a heated discussion of various plans to rescue the judge. Their men would follow them if they attacked, but the attack would be foredoomed to defeat. Allen, his face thoughtful, slipped away. At last the two brought their discussion to a close, for they realized they were wasting words. There was nothing to do except wait until the Mexican soldiers arrived, then scurry back across the border. CHAPTER X A ROMAN BATTERING-RAM It was noon. A molten sun looked down from a copper sky. The rocks reflected the terrific glare. What little shade there was brought no ease from the furnacelike heat. As one man expressed it: "You roast in the sun and stew in the shade." The water was gone, and there would be no more until evening; the men's suffering from thirst was intense. All thought themselves beaten. "Reckon the judge is due to get his neck stretched," Toothpick Jarrick confided dolorously to Silent Moore. The two were sprawled behind a boulder in the thin shade cast by a cactus. The taciturn deputy thrust out his jaw and growled: "We sticks just the same." Sam Hogg wormed his way between the blistering rocks and joined them. He nudged Toothpick and pointed up toward the valley wall behind them. "What's the Wolf doin' up there? He's been lookin' through those glasses of his for an hour and shiftin' his position constant. Yuh reckon he's figurin' up somethin'?" the cattleman asked eagerly.