le possessions, especially the
tools and remnants of medical supplies. They left everything
else in the houses, just as they were when they were using them,
except the bark hut, from which they took away all furnishings,
as it was too light to resist the invasion of a large wild beast
like a grizzly bear. But they fastened up Castle Howard and the
Annex so securely that no wandering beast could possibly break
in. They sunk their canoes in shallow water among reeds, and
then, when each had provided himself with a large supply of
jerked buffalo and deer meat and a skin water bag, they were
ready to depart.

"We may find our houses and what is in them all right when we
come back, or we may not," said Dick.

"But we take the chance," said Albert cheerfully.

Early on a spring morning they started down the valley by the
same way in which they had first entered it. They walked along
in silence for some minutes, and then, as if by the same impulse,
the two turned and looked back. There was their house, which had
sheltered them so snugly and so safely for so long, almost hidden
now in the foliage of the new spring. There was a bit of
moisture in the eyes of Albert, the younger and more sentimental.

"Good-by," he said, waving his hand. "I've found life here."

Dick said nothing, and they turned into the main valley. They
walked with long and springy steps, left the valley behind them,
and began to climb the slopes. Presently the valley itself
became invisible, the mountains seeming to close in and blot it
out.

"A stranger would have to blunder on it to find it," said Dick.

"I hope no one will make any such blunder," said Albert.

The passage over the mountains was easy, the weather continuing
favorable, and on another sunshiny morning they reached the
plains, which flowed out boundlessly before them. These, too,
were touched with green, but the boys were perplexed. The space
was so vast, and it was all so much alike, that it did not look
as if they could ever arrive anywhere.

"I think we'd better make for Cheyenne in Wyoming Territory,"
said Dick.

"But we don't know how far away it is, nor in what direction,"
said Albert.

"No; but if we keep on going we're bound to get somewhere. We've
got lots of time before us, and we'll take it easy."

They had filled their skin water bags, made in the winter, at the
last spring, and they set out at a moderate pace over the plain.
Dick had thought once of v