“I don’t want to get mixed up in any fight!” exclaimed Ward Porton. “Maybe we had better get back to the United States side of the river.”
“That’s the talk!” put in Packard Brown. “Come on!”
All left the ranch and headed directly for the river, at the point where Ward had left his flat-bottomed rowboat. Dave and Roger followed them, but did their best to keep out of sight in the tall grass.
“Oh, Dave, I hope they do go over to the other shore!” exclaimed the senator’s son. “It will be so much easier to capture them.”
“Exactly, Roger. And don’t you remember what Ward told his father––that he had left the miniature cases hidden on the other side? He said they were on a high knoll not far from where the boats had been tied up. We ought to be able to find that cache.”
By the time the two chums gained the shore of the Rio Grande those ahead of them had already entered Ward Porton’s boat. Ward and Brown each had an oar and rowed as rapidly as possible to the other side of the stream. Jarvey Porton sat in the stern of the craft, and looked back from 282 time to time, trying to catch sight of the guerrillas and the other Mexicans, who were still shouting and firing at a distance.
“Hadn’t you better hold back a bit, Dave, so they don’t see you?” questioned Roger, as he and our hero managed to gain the rowboat they had used, which, fortunately, had been placed some distance away from the other craft.
“Good advice, Roger, if it wasn’t for one thing. I don’t want to give them a chance to get out of our sight. Let us tie our handkerchiefs over the lower parts of our faces. Then they won’t be able to recognize us––at least unless we get pretty close.”
With Dave’s suggestion carried out, the chums leaped into the rowboat, and, this done, each took an oar. They pulled hard, and as a consequence reached the mouth of the little creek on the United States side in time to see those ahead just disembarking.
“Where do you suppose they are going?” queried the senator’s son.