d stiff forty miles an' more from hyer,"
said Jack Blowfen. "But I know the road over the second foothills
perfectly. So if ye say the word any time we'll start."

"It looks like rain just now," said Paul.

"An' ye'll catch it heavy, too," put in Dottery.

"We'll have to look after the cattle, too," added Chet. "Like as not
half of them are in the sink hole."

"I'll help ye with the stock," said Blowfen.

That evening it rained in torrents, but only for a short while. By
midnight it was as clear as it could be. Long before sunrise the boys
and Blowfen were out on the range looking up the heads belonging to the
Winthrops.

They were gratified to find that all the stock was safe with a single
exception. That was an old cow who had been caught in the cyclone and
killed. Not one of the four-footed beasts had gone anywhere near the
sink hole.

When let out of the closet Captain Grady begged hard for his liberty.
But the boys were obdurate and Caleb Dottery backed them up, as did
Jack Blowfen.

"Ye have done wrong an' must suffer," said the latter, and there the
matter rested.

By nine o'clock the two boys and Blowfen were off. They took with them
enough provisions to last several days, as the journey upon which they
were about to enter would be for the greater part through a dry and
unproductive section. This same section has now been made, by a system
of irrigation, very productive.

"And now to find Uncle Barnaby and bring our enemies to terms!" cried
Paul, as they rode out of the stockade.

"So say I, and may uncle be found well," added Chet.

"Amen," murmured Jack Blowfen.

CHAPTER XXIV.

Something about Barnaby Winthrop

"My uncle a prisoner about ten miles from here?" repeated Allen
Winthrop, after Lou Slavin had made his confession.

"Will you shut up?" howled Bluckburn, savagely. "You'll spoil
everything."

"An' he'll save hisself from bein' lynched," added old Ike Watson,
suggestively.

"We haven't done anything--you can't hold us," spluttered Bluckburn. He
found himself in a bad corner.

"Holding a man a prisoner is nothing, I presume," said Allen, in deep
anger. "Go on," he continued to Slavin. "Where is my uncle?"

Thus urged, Lou Slavin blurted out a full confession, telling how
Barnaby Winthrop had been followed to San Francisco by Bluckburn, who
wanted to learn the secret of the new claim, which Bluckburn realized
must be valuable.

Slavin said it was Bluckburn who had sen