"Hey, I'll tell you!" hollered Isham, his voice rising above the babel like the roar of a mountain bull, "I'll tell you where they've gone! Up Devil's Chasm and plumb over the summit—they couldn't get nowhere's else! Didn't we trail 'em to the crick, and ain't we rode clean to Tonto, cutting circles to pick up their tracks? Well, they crossed then I'm telling ye, even if you fellers couldn't, and by this time they're clean to Geronimo!"
"Well, let's go to Geronimo, then," spoke up Cal Randolph's even voice, "what's the use of trying to climb this mountain?"
"They may be hid up there," cried Isham. "But cripes, boys, we know one thing—they never went down that crick. And if they didn't go there where else could they go, except——"
He paused as a voice began shouting his name, and Hall peeped over the rampart. A man had ridden down to their camp across the creek and was waving his hat and hallooing.
"What d'ye want?" demanded Isham, walking to the edge of the bench and looking across at the runner, "what's the matter with you, anyhow?"
"Your wife says to come home!" shouted the messenger. "They's been a big raid—all your horses are run off! And three of the boys was found hung!"
"Hung!" echoed Isham, and every man in the party jumped up and ran to the rim.
"What's that?" they clamored, and Hall and Allifair rose up to catch the startling news.
"W'y, they was night-riders," explained the runner. "They wore masks and dressed like Injuns! Yes, come in at night and caught three boys standing guard! We found them hung to a tree! And they run off all your horses!"
"Hell's fire!" exclaimed Isham, and stood staring across the canyon while his men gathered together in groups.