“I hated to see him go,” he confided to Sandy, “I wonder if he’ll ever come over and visit us at the mine.”
“I sincerely hope so.”
“He come all right,” Toma assured them. “He tell me mebbe he ride over tomorrow to see how we get along.”
A few miles farther on the forest thinned out and presently they rode forth across an open prairie. To the south lay the plateau. Far to the westward, a chain of purple-belted hills extended back to meet the rugged slope of Dominion Range. In this direction, above the horizon’s broken rim, they could discern plainly many snowy mountain peaks.
“It take about three hours to get back to mine,” guessed Toma.
Dick, gazing away in the direction of the plateau, nodded his head.
“Yes, it shouldn’t take much longer than that.”
He paused, squinting in the bright morning sunlight.
“I wonder if my eyes are deceiving me,” he suddenly broke forth. “What are those dark spots a little west and south of here? Looks to me like a band of horsemen.”
“Unless it’s a whole tribe of Indians on the march—it couldn’t be that,” Sandy interposed, reining up his pony. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was a big herd of cattle.”