“Well, hardly,” he said. “It will take a dozen or more of us to handle that job when the time comes. But in the meantime I don’t want to give him any idea that he is being watched or that the Secret Service is after him. That’s the way we always do things—wait till we are ready and the plum’s right for picking, and then go and get it with neatness and dispatch.”
“That’s why you didn’t let Mr. Chillingworth know you were in the vicinity, then?” cried Tom.
“That’s it,” agreed Sam Hartley. “You see, I figured that they were likely to be watching his place, and so I gave it a wide berth. But I guess there’s no harm in showing myself to him now. It’s evident that Bully Banjo doesn’t fear anything, or he’d not be running the Chinks through so boldly.”
Sam walked off into the brush a little way and soon reappeared with a small burro. Helped by the boys, he loaded his cooking utensils and other camping apparatus on the little creature’s back and then they set off through the brush, headed for a trail of which Sam knew. It was characteristic of Sam Hartley that already he was more familiar with the country about than most of the ranchers.
“There’s one thing that puzzles me, though,” he said, “and that is how those fellows ever get into the canyon yonder from the sea.”
“Why they come in by a trail, don’t they?” asked Jack innocently.
“Oh, no they don’t, for I watched them pretty sharply. I’m willing to swear that they didn’t come in by any trail. No, sir,” grunted Sam, with an air of conviction. “Either those rascals have an airship or else they travel under ground.”
“Well, they haven’t got an airship, that’s certain,” laughed Tom.
“That’s right,” agreed the detective; “therefore, they come under the ridge of hills that separates the canyon from the sea. But how—well, I’ll tell you,” he went on, without waiting for the boys to speak. “My theory is that this river burrows its way under that ridge, and that the rascals have some sort of a tunnel there they get through.”
“Do you really think so?” asked Tom, rather frankly incredulous.