They were all of the long-horned species, and some of them were very large. The train was run on a sidetrack, and as fast as the cars were emptied they were moved further down the sidetrack until every car had been emptied.
"Oh, my, Fred!" said Evelyn, "surely some of those cattle must have been hurt, crowded as they were in those cars, with such long horns."
A careful inspection was made and not one was found to be seriously hurt. Fred had stipulated with the ranchmen whom he had bought front that only a given number should be placed in a car, and Superintendent Westervelt had warned the employees of the road not to exceed the limit.
That night Fred and Terry rode all around the enclosed part of the range on the lookout for wolves, and also to let the cowboys see that they were expected to do their work faithfully.
The new cattle grazed incessantly, but nothing occurred during the night to start an alarm among them. The majority of them, as dark set in, laid down to sleep or to chew their cud.
The two boys turned in at about two o'clock in the morning.
The next day one of the cowboys came in and reported that somebody down at the lower end of the ranch had cut out a complete panel of the barbed wire, thus leaving a wide gap for the cattle to go through.
Fred and Terry hurried down there on their horses with their Winchesters, accompanied by two of their most expert and faithful cowboys and made a thorough investigation.
They could see the tracks of three men, who had probably cut the wires; but they were unable to find the trail of any cattle passing through the gap. In fact, none of the cattle had done any grazing that far down.
They sent a cowboy back up to the ranch-house and had him bring down a coil of wire and the necessary tools to connect it with the wires that had been cut, and when that was done they detailed one-half of their force to watch the line of the fence at that end of the ranch during the following night.