trap."

From that point they rode up the wash and gradually out into the middle
of the valley. Bands of wild horses trooped away in the distance.
Clouds of moving dust beyond the rolling ridges of the valley told of
others in motion. They were pretty wild, considering that they had
never been chased. At length Pan decided that many of these herds had
come into this valley from other points nearer to Marco. Some bands
stood on ridge tops, with heads erect, manes flying, wild and ragged,
watching the two riders move along the wash.

Pan did not observe any evidence of water, but he hardly expected to
find any in that wash. A very perceptible ascent in that direction
explained the greater number of horses. The sage was stubby and rather
scant near at hand, yet it lent the beautiful color that was so
appreciable from a distance.

Intersecting washes were few and so deep and steep-walled that there
need be no fear of horses going down them into the main wash.
Out-croppings of rock were rare; the zone of cactus failed as the
valley floor lost its desert properties; jack rabbits bounded away
before the approach of the horses; a few lean gray coyotes trotted up
to rises of ground, there to watch the intruders.

Pan had been deceived in his estimate of the size of the valley. They
rode ten miles west before they began to get into rougher ground, scaly
with broken rock, and gradually failing in vegetation. The notch of
the west end loomed up, ragged and brushy, evidently a wild jumble of
cliffs, ledges, timber and brush. The green patch at the foot meant
water and willows. Pan left his father to watch from a high point
while he rode on five miles farther. The ascent of the valley was like
a bowl. The time came when he gazed back and down over the whole
valley. Before him lines and dots of green, widely scattered, told of
more places where water ran. Strings of horses moved to and fro, so
far away that they were scarcely distinguishable. Beyond these points
no horses could be seen. The wash wound like a black ribbon out of
sight. The vast sloping lines of valley swept majestically down from
the wooded bluff-like sides. It was an austere, gray hollow of the
earth, with all depressions and ridges blending beautifully into the
soft gray-green dotted surface.

Pan rode back to join his father.

"It's a big place, and we've got a big job on our hands," he remarked.

"While you was gone a band of two hundred or