"Now, the question is, what's the best thing to do?" he asked himself.
"Make for home, as soon as I can, and give the alarm," he reasoned. "I've
got to give the alarm, if Sunger hasn't already gotten there and given it
for me."

Off on the dark and lonely trail he started. It was quite different from
traveling over it on the back of his speedy pony. But it was something to
be free, and free sooner than the robbers had any idea he would be.

"I may even be able to catch up to them, and trace which way they go," Jack
thought.

He walked on for nearly an hour, when he heard the trot of a number of
Horses some distance ahead of him. Jack halted and listened intently.

"I wonder if those are the hold-up men coming back, to make sure I'm still
tied up, or if it's my friends?" thought Jack. "I can't afford to take a
chance. I'll hide in the bushes until I see who they are."

He knew every inch of the trail. Near the spot where he was, was a hole in
the side of the hill where some badly directed man had once started to dig
a gold mine. He had not gone far before he discovered that iron pyrites was
the only "gold" in that locality. The hole was never filled up, and was now
almost hidden from sight by a heavy growth of underbrush.

"That's the place for me," Jack mused. A few strides took him to it, and he
stepped in to await, in concealment, the passage of the oncoming horsemen.

Something soft and yielding came in contact with Jack's foot. He started,