sh ranch was
a busy place. Several new herds were bought and pastured and more men
were hired. There was no trouble, now, in getting men from near by,
for the story of the passing of the menacing gas was told all over.

Old Tosh was kept busy making his Elixer, for though the men knew it
was comparatively useless as a medicine, some of them thought it did
them good, and they rather liked the root beer taste it had.

"Why don't you put your full name on your labels?" asked Nort of the
queer old codger one day, when the boys were visiting him in his, or,
rather, their cave, which he had fitted up to live in while he did his
brewing. "You just call it 'Tosh Elixer.'"

"That's enough for a name," he chuckled. "But my first name, if you
want to know it is Simon. I don't fancy it so I seldom use it."

"Simon Tosh!" murmured Bud. "S.T. Why," he cried, "those were the
initials signed to that warning we received while we were on our way
here. Did you come to our camp and leave that note?"

"Yes, I did," was the answer. "I heard a new crowd was coming to Death
Valley and I thought I'd save their lives if I could warn them not to
come. I knew there was something with a queer smell, coming out of the
earth, that killed men, horses and cattle. But I couldn't find out
what it was. But I knew enough to get out of my cave and the glen when
I caught the first whiff of the queer perfume. It didn't get me."

"No, but it did for enough poor fellows, and for too many of our stock
before we found out what it was," said Nort.

"I never could understand, though," said Mr. Tosh, after he had
identified the two warning notes which Bud produced from his wallet, "I
never could understand why the gas came at some times and not at
others. You never knew when to look for it."

"Professor Dodson explained that," stated Bud. "It was due to the
height of the underground stream, and also the stream in the open. At
low water there wasn't enough fluid to cover the bed of chemicals, and
so no gas was generated. When the water rose, the gas was given off."

"Science is wonderful," murmured the old man.

The boys left him brewing his kettle of herbs. He insisted on giving
them a bottle of the Elixer though he knew they would not swallow any
of it.

"Give it to Fah Moo," suggested Mr. Tosh. "But tell him not to drink
it all at once."

"We will," promised Dick with a chuckle.

The boys rode home over the rolling plains, dotted