I vamoosed."

"Well, maybe there was something queer about the ranch years ago,"
admitted Mr. Merkel. "But that doesn't say, because fifteen or twenty
seasons back something queer happened, that it's still going on."

"Oh, but it is!" declared Billee. "Not a month ago I met a puncher who
was lookin' for a job. He come here but I knew we was full up so I
told him to go over to Circle T, and he done so. But he'd been down
Death Valley way recent like, and he said it was just the same."

"You mean about mysterious deaths?" asked Dick.

"That's it, boy! So what I says is, lay off that place, Boss!"

"Hum!" mused Mr. Merkel. "It doesn't sound very jolly. I don't want
anybody to take any unnecessary risks and yet I hate to lose my money."

"You shan't lose it, Dad!" cried Bud.

"What do you mean, son?"

"Just this! Dick, Nort and I will go down there! We aren't going to
be scared off by any of Billee's tales! We're not afraid; are we?"

He looked at his fellow boy ranchers.

"Nothing to it!" declared Dick, valiantly.

"Let's go!" cried Nort, eagerly.

Undaunted by fear, the three lads ranged themselves alongside of Mr.
Merkel, waiting for his word.

CHAPTER III

ON THE TRAIL

Slowly the owner of Diamond X began to speak.

"That's just about what I'd expect of you boys," remarked Mr. Merkel
with a smile as he surveyed the lads. "But I can't let you run your
heads into a noose."

"That's just what they would be doing if they tried to ride herd in
Death Valley," came ominously from the veteran puncher.

"Watch me get him!" whispered Bud to his cousins. Then, addressing Old
Billee he went on: "I don't reckon, if we hit the trail for Dad's new
Dot and Dash ranch--I don't reckon you'll come with us; will
you--Billee?" and he drawled the last few words with a wink at Nort and
Dick.

"Who, me? Go out there with you if your Pa thinks he'll let you? Is
that what you asted me?" demanded Billee Dobb, sharply.

"You heard me the first time!" chuckled Bud. "What say?"

"Course I'll go with you an' you know it!" snapped the old man. "Hu!
What you think I am, anyhow?"

"But you just said you vamoosed from Death Valley because you were
afraid," said Bud.

"Well, what I mean I _was_ afraid!" admitted Billee. "It was a mighty
skeery feelin', I'm tellin' you, to start out in the mornin' an' not
know whether you'd come acrost some dead puncher 'fore you'd ridden
half way round the herd. I sure