termined to find the
water.

Riding perhaps two hundred yards into that narrow gap In the ridge, he
found the way suddenly becoming steep and roughly strewn with boulders,
and, thinking to make better time, left his horse tied to a bush in the
shadow of the rocky wall, while he climbed up the dry watercourse on
foot. He found, as Phil had said, that it was not far. Another hundred
yards up the boulder-strewn break in the ridge, and he came out into a
beautiful glade, where he found the spring, clear and cold, under a
moss-grown rock, in the deep shade of an old gnarled and twisted cedar.
Gratefully he threw himself down and drank long and deep; then sat for a
few moments' rest, before making his way back to his horse. The moist,
black earth of the cuplike hollow was roughly trampled by the cattle
that knew the spot, and there were well-marked trails leading down
through the heavy growth of brush and trees that clothed the hillsides.
So dense was this forest growth, and so narrow the glade, that the
sunlight only reached the cool retreat through a network of leaves and
branches, in ever-shifting spots and bars of brightness. Nor could one
see very far through the living screens.

Patches was on the point of going, when he heard voices and the sound of
horses' feet somewhere above. For a moment he sat silently listening.
Then he realized that the riders were approaching, down one of the
cattle trails. A moment more, and he thought he recognized one of the
voices. There was a low, murmuring, whining tone, and then a rough,
heavy voice, raised seemingly in anger. Patches felt sure, now, that he
knew the speakers; and, obeying one of those impulses that so often
prompted his actions, he slipped quietly into the dense growth on the
side of the glade opposite the approaching riders. He was scarcely
hidden--a hundred feet or so from the spring--when Nick Cambert and
Yavapai Joe rode into the glade.

If Patches had paused to think, he likely would have disdained to play
the part of a hidden spy; but he had acted without thinking, and no
sooner was he concealed than he realized that it was too late. So he
smiled mockingly at himself, and awaited developments. He had heard and
seen enough, since he had been in the Dean's employ, to understand the
suspicion in which the owner of the Four-Bar-M iron was held; and from
even his few days' work on the range in company with Phil, he had come
to understand how difficult it was for the