boot heels. To the cholla hung here and there scraps of cloth. A blood
splash stared at them from an outcropping slope of rock.

Jim swung from the saddle and rescued the hat from the spines. Inside
the sweat band were the initials L.K. Silently he handed the hat to
Phil.

"It's his hat," the boy cried.

"It's his hat," Jim agreed. "They must have laid for him here. He put up
a good scrap. Notice how that cholla is cut to ribbons. Point is, what
did they do to him?"

They searched the ground thoroughly, and discovered no body hidden in
the brush.

"They've taken him away. Likely he's alive," Yeager decided aloud at
last.

"Brill couldn't have been in this. He was at the Frying Pan before I
was."

"I reckon he ordered it done. If that's correct they will be holding
Larry till Brill gets there to give further orders."

Phil entered an objection. "That doesn't look to me like Brill's way.
He's not scared of any man that lives. When he squares accounts with
Keller he'll be on the job himself."

"That's so, too," admitted Yeager. "Still, I figure this is Healy's