He knew every inch of the trail. Near the spot where he was, was a hole in the side of the hill where some badly directed man had once started to dig a gold mine. He had not gone far before he discovered that iron pyrites was the only "gold" in that locality. The hole was never filled up, and was now almost hidden from sight by a heavy growth of underbrush.
"That's the place for me," Jack mused. A few strides took him to it, and he stepped in to await, in concealment, the passage of the oncoming horsemen.
Something soft and yielding came in contact with Jack's foot. He started, thinking he must have stepped on some sleeping beast. But there came no outcry, which would have followed in that case.
"It can't be dead leaves," mused the lad, "it doesn't feel that way.
What—"
He stooped down and felt with his hands. A thrill ran through him.
"The mail pouches!" he exclaimed in a hoarse whisper. "The mail pouches the robbers took from me! They hid them here, and I've found them! What luck!"
CHAPTER XI
DUMMY LETTERS
Jack was so overjoyed at his queer and unexpected discovery that, for the moment, he forgot all about the approaching horsemen from whom he had hidden himself. Then there came a thought to him.
"Perhaps the pouches are empty! If the rascals have taken all the mail out and just thrown the empty pouches in here, that isn't such a great discovery after all!"