Some of them are dead," answered Bart. "We did not wish to shoot them,
but they forced us to do so in self-defense."

At this moment shots and cries came from up the canyon, and, a few
seconds later, a man came into view and rode his horse down toward the
bowlders which had served the boys as a fort.

It was Jack Long, the sheriff.

"Hurrah!" cried Frank, leaping to his feet and waving his hat. "Our
friends are coming!"

Long rode up slowly, gazing in unutterable amazement at dead horses and
men stretched on the ground.

"Well," he said, as he drew rein, "it looks like there had been a right
smart scrimmage here. Who was in it?"

"We were attacked, and had to stand them off," explained Frank.

"You?" cried the sheriff, his amazement increasing--"you youngsters? Did
you do all this shooting?"

"We didn't do all the shooting you may have heard, but we did some of
it, and what you see shows we did not waste all our bullets."

"Holy smoke! We captured two fellows, back there, both wounded, and they
said you boys did it; but I couldn't hardly credit that. You must have
fought like wildcats! This knocks me. If I ever open my trap about kids
again I hope I may choke!"

In a few moments Big Gabe and Sile Jones appeared, escorting the wounded
prisoners, and the boys felt that there was no further danger of another
attack from the counterfeiters.

Paul Scott, the husband of Isa, had been killed in battle. Great was her
grief when she came upon his dead body.

The men slain in the struggle were buried there in the ravine.

The counterfeiters' cave and the hidden cabin were visited. Dies and
presses, together with a large amount of "queer" money, were found. The
counterfeiters who had escaped from the battle had taken to their heels,
and they were not captured.

Then it transpired that "Silas Jones, of Michigan," was, in truth, Dan
Drake, of the Secret Service, a fact which had been known to Jack Long
all the while. Drake had been working for a long time to find the den of
this band of counterfeiters.

On the return to the lake Vida Melburn's nearly distracted father,
uncle, and aunt were found, and the girl was restored to them.

Then Bart Hodge and Frank Merriwell were introduced, and the girl
somewhat maliciously informed her father that the person who had fought
to save her from her kidnapers was the very boy he had forbidden her to
see or correspond with.

It is needless to say that Bart and Frank were tre