boards they could hear his breathing. He was sound asleep.

Slowly, on hands and knees, they crawled around the west side toward
the entrance. In the right hand of the one in front was the dull glint
of a knife. The other held a revolver.

Cautiously the one ahead tried the screen door--pushing it open an inch
or two. It was unlatched. Motioning for the other to stand by the
door, he arose, pushed the door back with his left hand very slowly so
as not to make a squeak. In the right he held the knife.

Bob stirred in his sleep and turned on the cot. The Mexican stood
motionless, ready to spring either way if he awoke. But the steady
breathing of a sound sleeper began again.

The Mexican let the door to softly and took one quick step toward the
bed.

Then with a wild, blood-curdling yell he fell on the floor. Something
from above had leaped on him, something that enveloped him, that
grappled with him. He went down screaming and stabbing like a madman.
His companion at the door fired one shot in the air, dropped his gun,
and ran as if all the devils in hell were after him.

The commotion awoke Bob. Instantly he sat up in bed, and as he rose he
reached for a gun with one hand and a flashlight with the other. In an
instant the light was in the Mexican's face--and the gun also.

"Hold up your hands, Madrigal." Bob's tone brought swift obedience.
Around the Mexican and on him were the ripped and torn fragments of a
dummy man--made of a sack of oats, with flapping arms and a tangle of
ropes. Bob had not felt sure but some attempt might be made on his
life, and half in jest and half as a precaution, he and Noah had put
this dummy overhead with a trip rope just inside the door. They knew
the fright of something unexpected falling on an intruder would be more
effective than a machine gun.

"Get up," Bob ordered, and the shaken Madrigal staggered to his feet,
with his hands held stiffly straight up. "March out." Rogeen's
decision had come quickly. He followed with the gun in close proximity
to the Mexican's back.

Madrigal was ordered to pick up a hoe and a shovel, and then was
marched along the water ditch toward the back of the field.

"Here." Bob ordered a stop. They were half a mile from the road, at
the edge of the desert. The Mexican had recovered enough from his
first fright to feel the cold clutch of another, surer danger. "Dig,"
ordered Bob. And the Mexican obeyed. "About two feet that w