ble, and head away from the valley.

Some five minutes later three youthful figures mounted on a trio of
splendid specimens of horse flesh, loped easily up a trail leading from
the natural basin in the hills. In Jack's pocket, too, reposed a
certain paper found on the table in the hut and signed with Ramon de
Barros' name. With a vague idea that it might prove useful to him, the
boy had appropriated it, and shoved it hastily in his pocket.

The summit of the basin reached, the boys found themselves not far from
a broad, white road. The compass, which Jack still had on his wrist,
showed the direction to be about due east and west. Crossing a stretch
of grass, which separated them from the thoroughfare, the three young
horsemen were soon standing on the ribbonlike stretch of white which
wound its way through a country pleasantly green and fresh-looking
after their sojourn in the desert.

"Looks like the promised land," cried Walt.

"I'll bet we're the first bunch to find the promised land via the
underground railway," laughed Ralph, as they gazed about them,
undecided in which direction to proceed.

CHAPTER XII.

MADERO'S FLYING COLUMN.

As they stood there, still undecided as to which direction to take,
Jack's keen eyes detected, above a clump of trees some distance down
the road to the west, a cloud of yellow dust rising. Evidently
somebody was coming their way. The question was, who was it?

It might be some one of whom they could inquire the direction to the
Esmeralda mine--for Jack had determined to seek out his father, knowing
the mine could not be very far distant. Again it might be a band of
insurrectos, in which case they would have jumped out of the frying pan
into the fire with a vengeance.

"Shall we ride forward?" asked Walt, as Jack's lips tightened in deep
thought.

The other boy pushed back his sombrero. Jack Merrill was only a lad,
after all, and he found himself suddenly called upon to answer a
question which might have stumped a grown man. The question, however,
was decided for him, and by a means so utterly unexpected that it came
near jolting the Border Boys out of their composure; for Jack, as they
had ridden up from the river, had admonished his companions to keep
cool minds and wits and stiff upper lips whatever happened. They were
going into a country in which, from what they had been able to gather,
the insurrectos were numerically and strategically strong. Their only