g."

In a few weeks the dam was constructed, the stream, where it ran in the
open, was shifted several hundred feet and there was no longer any
danger of it dissolving the chemicals and carrying the deadly gas
underground, to send it up out of fissures to the detriment of man and
beast. While the work was going on, all cattle were removed from the
vicinity of the defile, which was found to be the only danger spot on
Dot and Dash.

The boys recalled the time when, in riding over the range, their horses
had taken such a sudden fright. They could not determine whether at
that time some poison gas might have seeped out, alarming the sensitive
beasts, or whether it was something like a snake which might have
startled the ponies. It was one of the things that remained unsolved,
but it was a minor phase of the main problem which had been brought to
a successful conclusion.

And so, in this comparatively simple manner, was the mystery solved and
an end put to Death Valley, though it retained that name for many years.

Some time after all danger was removed, when cattle roamed freely over
the range, as near the defile as they cared to go, and when Old Tosh
was again allowed to brew his Elixer in the cave, a man was arrested in
Los Pompan for horse stealing. He was convicted and it developed he
was one of the men who had used the poison gas tanks against the boy
ranchers. He was one of a gang.

They had nothing to do with and knew nothing of the emanations of
natural gas in Death Valley. They had heard the sinister reputation of
the place, but that did not keep them out, and they discovered the cave
and at once jumped to the conclusion that it contained gold. They
frightened away Old Tosh and when Bud stumbled on their operations they
adopted the sinister form of defense they used later. One of the men
in the gang had served in the chemical warfare division of the A.E.F.
overseas. He was an expert chemist and developed a gas that would
knock a man out but not kill him. Thus Bud was made a prisoner,
escaping when the men left him for a time.

The gang had taken considerable of the yellow ore out of the cave, and,
doubtless after the battle in which they were worsted, they discovered
it to be valueless. So they had no reason to return to the territory.
The gang dispersed. None of them, it appeared, had ever suffered from
the effects of the natural gas.

Soon after the course of the stream was changed, Dot and Da