orse to a cottonwood tree a
half mile below the Dillenbeck water gates.

He skirted through the fields round the deserted guard camp. His
caution was not necessary, not a Mexican soldier was left. He grinned
to think of the boosters about now in the Red Owl. Two hundred yards
from the little open shack that served as office and home for the water
keeper Noah took off his shoes and left his hat, and slipped toward the
light. In his hands, muzzle forward, was the double-barrelled
shotgun--the riot gun sure to hit its mark at close range that Bob had
got for him with which to guard the Chandler ranch.

CHAPTER XXX

Noah, bent low, slipped forward in utter silence--more silence than
necessary. The American water keeper, Madrigal, and the Mexican guard
were too profoundly busy with a crap game on the floor under the
lantern to be disturbed by the mere breaking of a twig.

But all at once from out the night came a drawling voice:

"Brethren, let's raise our hands." Three pairs of eyes leaped up from
the dice and looked into the muzzle of the most vicious shotgun they
had ever seen--not ten feet away. Six hands went up without a word.

"Stand up," was the next drawling command. "Turn your backs." Noah
flung two small ropes at their feet.

"You," he ordered Madrigal, "tie the Mex's hands behind him--and stand
him over by the wall."

"Whitey," he ordered the water keeper when that was done, "tie the
Hebrew's hands and feet and set him down over by the wall, facing this
way.

"Now," Noah again commanded the water keeper, "go to the telephone and
order the water turned in. Tell 'em we are dry--that all the trouble
is settled, and to shoot the water down banks full, right away, quick."

The water keeper was shaking as though with the ague. He knew danger
when he saw it and he was perfectly sure he saw it.

He went to the telephone and called the keeper at the Valley Irrigation
Company's office. As he started to speak Madrigal stirred on the floor
as though trying to get up.

Still keeping the water keeper covered with the shotgun, Noah looked
round at Madrigal and drawled:

"If I was you, Hebrew, I'd keep sayin' over that parable which reads:
'Once there was a Mexican who was shot in the stomach with half a pint
of buckshot; and in hell he lifted up his eyes and said, "Father
Abraham, send me a drop of water." And Father Abraham says, "Not a
drop. Ain't you the man that helped burn up the Imperia