Hopalong and Red raced along the dam and separated when they struck the plain, soon returning with a cow apiece dragging from their lariats, which they released and pushed into the torrent. The bodies floated with the stream and both men feared their efforts were in vain. Then Hopalong uttered a shout of joy, for the carcasses, stranding against the top of the masonry core, stopped, the water surging over them. Racing away again they dragged up more cows until the bodies choked the gap, when they brought up armfuls of brush and threw them before the bodies. Then Red espied a shovel, swore furiously at what it told him, and fell to throwing dirt into the breach before the brush. He had to take it from different places so as not to weaken the dam, and an hour elapsed before they stopped work and regarded the results of their efforts with satisfaction. "Well, she's there yet, and she'll stay, all right. Good thing we didn't take th' hill trail," Hopalong remarked. "Somebody cut it, all right," Red avowed, looking at the shovel in his hands. "_H2_! Hoppy, see here! This is _their_ work!" "Shore enough H2 on th' handle, but Meeker an' his crowd never did that," Hopalong replied. "I ain't got no love for any of 'em, but they're too square for this sort of a thing. Besides, they want to use this water too much to cheat themselves out of every chance to get it." "You may be right--but it's d----d funny that we find their shovel on th' job," Red rejoined, scowling at the brand burned into the wooden handle. "What's that yo're treading on?" Hopalong asked, pointing to a bright object on the ground. Red stooped and then shouted, holding up the object so his friend could see it. "It's a brass button as big as a half-dollar--bet it belonged to th' snake that used this shovel!" "Yo're safe. I won't bet you--an' Antonio was th' only one I've seen wearing buttons like that in these parts," Hopalong replied. "I'm going to kill him on sight!" and he meant what he said. "Same here, th' ornery coyote!" Red gritted. "That Greaser has had me guessing, but I'm beginning to see a great big light," Hopalong remarked, taking the button and looking it over. "Yep, it's hissen, all right." "Well, we've filled her," Red remarked after a final inspection. "She'll hold until to-morrow, anyhow, or till we can bring th' chuck wagon full of tools an' rocks down here," Hopalong replied. "We'll make her solid for keeps when we begin. You better take th' evidence with you, Red, an' let Buck look 'em over. It's a good thing Buck spent that extra money putting in that stone core! Besides losing th' reservoir we'd have had plenty of dead cows by this time if it wasn't for that." "An' that Greaser went an' picked out the weakest spot in th' whole thing, or th' spot what would be th' weakest if that wall wasn't there," Red remarked. "He ain't no fool, but a stacked deck can beat a good head time after time."