as more French than Irish.

"He can show you the trail; and he hates the Craigmiles outfit as the
devil hates holy water. His father was a 'rustler,' and the colonel got
him sent over the road for cattle-stealing. Dick comes of pretty tough
stock, but I guess he'll do you right."

Ballard nodded, found his seat in the saddle, and gave the word.

"Pitch out, Dick," he commanded; and the small cavalcade of three
skirted the circle of tents and shacks to take the westward trail in
single file, the water-boy riding in advance and the Forestry man
bringing up the rear.

In this order the three passed the scene of the assisted land-slide,
where the acrid fumes of the dynamite were still hanging in the air, and
came upon ground new to Bigelow and practically so to Ballard. For a
mile or more the canal line hugged the shoulders of the foothills,
doubling and reversing until only the steadily rising sky-line of the
Elks gave evidence of its progress westward.

As in its earlier half, the night was still and cloudless, and the stars
burned with the white lustre of the high altitudes, swinging slowly to
the winding course in their huge inverted bowl of velvety blackness.
From camp to camp on the canal grade there was desertion absolute; and
even Bigelow, with ears attuned to the alarm sounds of the wilds, had
heard nothing when the cavalcade came abruptly upon Riley's camp, the
outpost of the ditch-diggers.

At Riley's they found only the horse-watchers awake. From these they
learned that the distant booming of the explosions had aroused only a
few of the lightest sleepers. Ballard made inquiry pointing to the
Craigmiles riders. Had any of them been seen in the vicinity of the
outpost camp?

"Not since sundown," was the horse-watcher's answer. "About an hour
before candle-lightin', two of 'em went ridin' along up-river, drivin' a
little bunch o' cattle."

The engineer gathered rein and was about to pull his horse once more
into the westward trail, when the boy guide put in his word.

"Somebody's taggin' us, all right, if that's what you're aimin' to find
out," he said, quite coolly.

Ballard started. "What's that?" he demanded. "How do you know?"

"Been listenin'--when you-all didn't make so much noise that I
couldn't," was the calm rejoinder. "There's two of 'em, and they struck
in just after we passed the dynamite heave-down."

Ballard bent his head and listened. "I don't hear anything," he
objected.

"Nachelly,