vanished like the mist before the sun.

"Ha-ho-hum!" yawned Pedro Gato, audibly.

Tom raised his head, studying their immediate surroundings. He
soon fancied he saw a safe way of slipping off to the southward
and finding the road again below where Gato stood.

Signing to Hazelton, Reade rose softly and started off. Two or
three minutes later the young engineers were a hundred yards away
from Gato, though in a rock-littered field where a single incautious
step might betray them.

"Come on, now," whispered Tom. "Toward the mine."

"And run into Gato?" grimaced Harry. "Great!"

"If we meet him we ought to get away with him between us," Tom
retorted. "One of us did him up this morning."

"Go ahead, Tom!"

Reade led the way in the darkness. They skirted the road, though
keeping a sharp lookout.

"There are the lights of the mule-train ahead," whispered Tom.
"Now, we're close enough to see things, for there is _El Sombrero_
just ahead."

"What's the game, anyway?" whispered Harry.