that?" c

ere?" dem

re in a holster at his belt, and, it might

e of Pocut Pete, who, it seemed, had returned after sh

ou were shooting at th

the gloom. "I saw something movin' down among th' cattle, an'

d Nort. "Wa

I wasn't takin' any chances. I didn't aim t' hit him, though, only t' scare him, an' I mus

cousins, their worried interest in the stoppage of

aste to say. "If it was a rustler he's far enough off by this

look," declared Bud, and his c

Pete, easily. "If I d

ed in the direction whence the shot had been heard and the sliver of flame seen. Pocut Pete h

he'd want to see if

r he and the others realized that sounds, especially voices, carr

talk that way t

exactly just like the way he acts. Did you fellow

was not so sure. "What do you m

having found the small, thin, broken phial of dubious-

'dope,' or medicine of

s reply. "But let's look aro

e coyotes only occasionally gave vent to their blood-curdling yells. But as for find

ter all," mused Dick, as he and hi

s a four-flusher, that fellow is, in my opi

cowboy," de

ocut Pete chaps," grumbled the boy rancher. "But we've got other worries besides him, fellows! What are we

e," Dick agreed. "Maybe the

t does,"

o find out what's wrong," decided Bud. "Talk about black rab

as bad as your father's in losing

re at Diamond X Second," went on Bud. "If it starts, a

g, and it was his first experience as a rancher "on hi

ort, as they turned in for the night, having discovered no

f-heartedly

e when the sun shone again, and, after breakfast, the boy ranchers prepar

o calculate how much longer it would last if the supply were not replenished. Already it was

were looked to (for who knew what beast might not lurk in t

id as the little party starte

orused Nort,

tered the bl

r shape, opening into it, and on the bottom, or floor, a two-foot iron pipe out of which, at normal times

dow. In fact the tunnel had been made, centuries ago, by a stream forcing its way through the soft parts of the mountain,

, as they might walk along the banks of a stream in the open. The underground river was not more than fo

Dick, as they walked in past the pipe, a

dded Nort, who had read that grim s

ntern so that it cast flickering shadows on the place

rt. "I should say no

nnel, with only the faint gleams of the lantern