, turning his dun-colored
mount again into the trail. "So far's I can make out, this is the only
way down out of these tall mountains to the east, so we might as well
get going. We ain't got no business south or west. We'll be just in
time to get blamed for what's happened down there."

Whatever there might be in the prospect, the rider did not permit it
to have any influence on his cheerful mood. He drew in long breaths of
the stimulating air and sniffed joyously at the fragrance of the
murmuring forests which clothed the higher hills. Far below the timber
would dwindle, the ridges would flatten into round knolls and lose
their verdure; then would come the dust and lava slopes, and
beyond--the desert.

A wistful light came into the horseman's eyes. "Home, Juniper, hoss,"
he said softly. "We've just got to have cactus an' water holes an'
danged blistering heat in ours; and I don't care so much as the faded
label off an empty tomato can if it's in California, or Arizona, or
Nevada, so long as it's desert!"

The trail he was following wound tortuously around ridges, through the
timber, into ravines and canyons; now treading close upon the bank of a
swift-running mountain stream in a narrow valley, and again seeking
the higher places where there were rocks and fallen trees and other
obstructions. An observer would have gleaned at once that the rider
was not familiar with the trail or territory he traversed.

So it was past noon when he finally reached the hogback where the
outstanding event of the morning had taken place. The rider looked
back up toward the divide and grinned as he rested his horse just
above the scene of the holdup.

"Don't reckon they'd have heard me if I'd hollered, or seen me if I'd
waved," he mused. "They picked out a good spot for the dirty work," he
concluded, looking about.

Shortly afterward, as he was staring down at the tracks in the road,
he smothered an exclamation. Then he dismounted, picked up two small
objects from the dust at the point where the trio had started on
their get-away, examined them with a puzzled expression, and thrust
them into a pocket.

"Queer," he ruminated; "mighty queer. If those silly things had been
laying there in the road before the rumpus they'd have been tracked
into the dust. But they was on _top_ of a perfectly good hoss track.
An' it don't look like there's been anybody along here since."

He continued down the road, descending the steep slope, and cam