and it sure is coming!"

"What black rabbit was that?" asked Nort, curiously.

"One that gave me a tumble when I was riding to meet you," answered
Bud. "I never saw one before, and I don't want to again. Not that I'm
superstitious, but there sure is something queer about _this_! I don't
like it for a cent!"

The boy ranchers and the Zuni Indian rode on, mounting higher and
higher along the mountain trail, heading for the summit. And when they
reached it, and Bud, by a glance at his watch, announced that it was
midnight, he followed with the suggestion that they camp there for the
remainder of the night.

"We can make the rest of the trip in a couple of hours, for it's down
hill," he said.

"Camp suits me," murmured Nort, and soon, after a bite to eat, they
rolled themselves in their blankets, having tied the ponies to scrub
bushes, and went to sleep. The riding of the boys, coupled with the
pure air they had breathed, brought them slumber almost at once, and
even Buck Tooth, alert as he usually was, neither saw nor heard
anything of the sinister visitor who came softly upon the sleeping ones
during the night hours.

For there did come a visitor in the night, as evidenced by a scrawled
warning, on a dirty piece of paper, fastened to a stubby tree by a
long, sharp thorn.

It was this fluttering bit of paper that caught Dick's eye when he
awakened, rather lame and stiff, and stretched himself in his blanket
as the sun shone in his eyes next morning.

"Hello!" he cried, taking a hasty look around to see if Bud had,
perchance, ridden away without awakening his companions, and had left
this note to tell them so. "What's the idea?" and then Dick noticed
that all three of his companions were stretched out near him, and the
four ponies were standing together not far away.

"What idea?" asked Bud, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

"That special delivery letter," and Dick pointed to it. "Wasn't here
last night," he went on, "for I tied Blackie to that tree before I
staked him out. What is it?"

Bud rolled out of his blanket, and took the piece of paper from the
tree.

"It's a warning!" he announced.

"A warning?" cried Nort and Dick, while Buck Tooth began making a fire.

"Yes," went on the boy rancher. "Here's what it says:

"'Don't take no more watter frum Pocut River if you want to stay
healthy!'"

"Whew!" whistled Dick. "What does that mean?"

"Just what I'd like to know," said Bud, and then a