Hardscrabble Tanks.

At the foot of this trail, Zurich and his party halted. Far out on the
eastern plain they saw, through Zurich's spyglass, a slow procession,
heading directly for them.

"We've beat 'em to it!" said Eric.

"That country out there is washed out something terrible, for all it
looks so flat," said Jim Scarboro sympathetically. "They've got to ride
slow. Gee, I bet it's hot out there!"

"One thing sure," said Eric: "there's no such mine as that on Fishhook.
I've prospected every foot of it."

"They'll noon at Sweetwater," said Zurich. "You boys go on up to
Hardscrabble. Take my horse. I'll go over to Sweetwater and hide out in
the rocks to see what I can find out. There's a stony place where I can
get across without leaving any trail.

"Unsaddle and water. Leave the pack here, you'd better, and my saddle.
They are not coming here--nothing to come for. You can sleep, turn about,
one watching the horses, and come on down when you see me coming back."

It was five hours later when the watchers on Hardscrabble saw the Johnson
party turn south, up the valley between barb and shank of the mountain;
an hour after that Zurich rejoined them, as they repacked at the trail
foot, and made his report:

"I couldn't hear where they're going; but it is somewhere west or
westerly, and it's a day farther on. Say, it's a good thing I went over
there. What do you suppose that fiend Johnson is going to do? You
wouldn't guess it in ten years. You fellows all know there's only
one way to get out of that Fishhook Valley--unless you turn round and
come back the way you go in?"

"I don't," said Bill. "I've never been down this way before."

"You can get out through Horse-Thief Gap, 'way in the southwest. There's
a place near the top where there's just barely room for a horse to get
through between the cliffs. You can ride a quarter mile and touch the
rocks on each side with your hands. Johnson's afraid some one will see
those tracks they're makin' and follow 'em up. I heard him tellin' it. So
the damned old fool has lugged dynamite all the way from Tucson, and
after they get through he's going to stuff the powder behind some of
those chimneys and plug Horse-Thief so damn full of rock that a goat
can't get over," said Zurich indignantly. "Now what do you think of that?
Most suspicious old idiot I ever did see!"

"I call it good news. That copper must be something extraordinary, or
he'd never take such a precaution," s