no telling. I'm not going to pass up anything until I find
out there's nothing in it!" retorted Bud. "Dot and Dash isn't going to
ruin if I can help it!"

"That's the idea!" echoed his cousins.

They rode about the place but could discover nothing wrong. The cows
seemed to have dropped in their tracks, dying without a struggle,
though the ground around them was considerably cut up by their hooves,
as though the animals had "milled" restlessly before death overtook
them.

The remaining and live members of the herd showed no uneasiness and no
signs of having been injured or disturbed as far as the boys could see
by riding among them.

They rode over to the stream, which the ponies showed an anxious desire
to drink from, but as Dick was riding his horse toward the clear water,
evidently to let the animal plunge its nose in, Bud cried:

"Do you think it's safe?"

"Why not?" Dick asked, momentarily pulling his pony back, and it was
not easy, for the creature was thirsty.

"Maybe this is the poison water the cows drank."

"Running water like this couldn't very well be poisoned," declared
Dick. "A stagnant pool or a water hole might be, but not this. And
horses won't touch bad water. Watch mine."

The pony fairly got beyond control, now, in its mad desire to quench
its thirst and was soon drinking greedily, an example followed by the
other two.

"Yes, I guess this water's all right," Bud finally admitted. "As you
say, a horse won't touch bad water. I'm going to sample some myself."

This he did, and he and his cousins found the stream sweet and
refreshing. There was no taint to it and they drank their fill as did
their ponies.

"Well, what next?" asked Nort, as he sat easily in the saddle, while he
watched the water dribbling from the champing jaws of his steed.
"Shall we go back and get that horse doctor, and then bury the dead
cows?"

"Not yet," answered Bud. "I want to ride up that defile and see what's
at the other end." He indicated a long, narrow valley leading up into
the wooded and rocky hills.

"What's the idea?" asked Dick.

"Oh, just a notion," Bud replied. "That would make a good hiding place
for rustlers," he added.

"It's dark, and silent and secret enough," agreed Dick as they turned
their horses into the defile. "Regular smugglers' glen!" and he
chuckled at his suggestion.

"We can call it that," assented Bud. "Come on, then, let's see what
we'll find in Smugglers' Glen."