ig Tony confidently.
"No fear. I usa da dynamite all-aready. I blow up da beega da house
once."

"A house and a big wooden bridge are quite different propositions. And a
wooden bridge isn't to be blown up like a stone or iron affair, you
know."

"Suppose you come, taka da look, see my plan all-aright, den," the
Italian suggested. "No one on disa side da bridge, to see, disa time
night."

The cowman hesitated. "Well, all right. It would be best to make sure.

"We don't want to carry this, though. Where'll we put it?"

As he spoke the man leaned over and picked up a good-sized parcel done up
in brown paper. From the careful way he handled it there could be no
doubt of its contents. It was the dynamite they proposed using.

"Here, I fin' da place."

Alex caught his breath at the display of carelessness with which the
foreigner took the deadly package. Backing into a nearby clump of bushes,
Big Tony stooped and placed the dynamite on the ground, well beneath the
branches.

"Dere. No one see dat. Come!"

As the two conspirators strode toward him, Alex crept closer into the
shadows of the willows. Passing almost within touch of him, they
continued up the gully, and soon were out of sight.

Before the footsteps of the two men had died away Alex was sitting
upright, debating a suggestion that caused him to smile. With decision he
arose, approached the bush under which the dynamite was concealed, and
reaching beneath with both hands, very carefully brought the package
forth and placed it on the ground in the moonlight. With great caution he
then undid the twine securing the parcel, and opened it. On discovering a
second wrapping of paper within, he uttered an exclamation of
satisfaction. Lifting out the inner parcel intact, he glanced about, and
choosing a group of bushes some distance away, carried the dynamite there
and concealed it. Returning, he secured the piece of outer wrapping
paper, and proceeded to carry out his idea.

Where the moonlight struck the western wall of the gully was a bed of
cracked, sun-baked clay. Making his way thither, Alex found a fragment a
little larger than the package of dynamite, and with his knife proceeded
to trim it into a square. Carefully then he wrapped this in the brown
paper, and wound it about with the cord just as the original parcel was
secured. And with a smile Alex placed this under the bush from which he
had taken the genuine package.

"Dynamite with that as much as