“Well, he wasn’t any too easy in his mind. So he roots me out to ride back--which I done. Yep, which I done.” Nick’s head started to nod, and Teddy motioned toward the bunk he was sitting on. Gently the two boys deposited the puncher on the bed, took his still smoking cigarette from his fingers, and left him to shake the rafters with healthy snores. “I don’t like the looks of this at all,” Roy declared, as soon as they reached the yard. “I kind of hate to leave mother alone with Marino around. If he should come back--” “I wouldn’t worry about that,” Teddy assured him. “Marino isn’t going to show his face around here for some time to come. And then, too, Nick will be here. Mother will be all right. She depends on Nick--and he’s a good man. Now we’ve got to tell her, and find Bug Eye and Pop. I suppose Bug Eye will want to go in that Fishmobile of his--but not with me. Suppose you see mother while I find the others?” Mrs. Manley took the news calmly. Nell and Ethel were disappointed that the boys were going to leave, but at Belle’s insistence they promised to remain until their return. “Bring back some fish,” Belle suggested. “Some trout, if you can.” “If we bring back any fish, they’ll be the kind that walk on land,” Roy declared grimly. His mind flew to The Pup, and he wondered if there was a chance of meeting him. Then, with a laugh, he dismissed the thought. “That would be the kind of thing you read about, but never happens,” he decided. “I reckon we’ll never see him again, nor our money or horse either.” Teddy’s idea was to bring the heavy canoe, which lay under a shed in the rear of the yard, to the water by one of the ranch trucks. Both the boys had often been on the river before in this canoe, but never had they been as far as the rapids, which gave the stream its name. The part that flowed by the ranch was broad and peaceful, and continued this way for some fifteen miles. Then, like a beast suddenly released from a cage, it became a roaring, whirling torrent, barely navigable, and dangerous always. It was down this stream, and past these rapids, that Roy and Teddy had to go to reach the cattle. When Bug Eye and Pop heard the news, they began preparations immediately. Pop examined the bottom of the canoe with minute care, he and Bug Eye going over every seam, for this was the boat to which they were to trust their lives. Bug Eye had received word by phone from Pete Ball that he was not needed for a time at the 8 X 8, and that Mr. Manley was welcome to his services. By one o’clock everything was in order. Roy, after several attempts, succeeded in awaking Nick for a few moments, and under the boy’s eyes the puncher wrote his instructions on a slip of paper, for Roy knew in his tired state he would never remember them. This over, Nick murmured something that may have been Chinese, but that sounded faintly like “good luck,” and, turning over, resumed his interrupted slumbers.