uncle tod, now that the first excitement was over, sat down on a stump near the log cabin shack and looked seriously and quizzically at rick and chot. ruddy had discovered a bone that he had buried a few days before, in case he might get hungry during the night, and the dog now dug up this tidbit and proceeded to enjoy himself. evidently he was glad to get back home again.
“look here, boys,” said uncle tod seriously, “this is all straight is it—i mean about you finding lost river?”
“of course it is,” declared rick.
“pretty hard for anything as crooked as lost river to be straight i guess!” chuckled sam. this was as near to a joke as he ever got.
“well, i mean you aren’t playing tricks on your old uncle; are you, rick,” went on mr. belmont. “i know you sometimes do joke, but you aren’t doing that now; are you?” he glanced sharply at the boy.
uncle tod was very much in earnest and there was a look on his face which would have caused rick to feel badly had the lad been playing any tricks. but he was not.
“we really found lost river,” he said. “and we know how to turn it back again; don’t we chot?”
“we sure do! i wanted to turn it before we came away, but rick said we’d better let you do it.”
“tell us about it!” begged uncle tod, and even sam seemed to glow with a more kindly and happier feeling since hearing the good news.
thereupon the boys detailed all their experiences on their expedition of discovery, beginning at the time when rick first suspected that possibly the river might be located somewhere to the south and west of the tunnel passage through which it had ceased to flow.
“you boys had nerve to go through that second dark tunnel, not knowing what you might find,” said uncle tod admiringly.
“nothing happened to amount to anything,” said rick.
“no, but think of what might have happened!” exclaimed sam. “you might both have fallen down some hole—yes, and ruddy, too, and we’d never know what had become of you.”
“but it didn’t happen!” laughed rick.
“now about these men in the camp you speak of,” went on uncle tod. “who were they?”
“we don’t know,” answered rick. “never saw any of ’em before. we couldn’t get close enough to hear what they said, or any names they used, but they looked like miners.”
“must be the lawson gang,” said sam to uncle tod.
“i reckon,” was the answer. “it would be like them to try a game of this sort.”
“the lawson gang’ll do anything!” sam asserted.
“but i haven’t heard of them being round this valley in a long time,” said uncle tod, who had lived in this part of the west many years before going east to develop his salt land.
“well it’s the lawson gang, i’m pretty sure,” said sam. “worse luck!”
“what is the lawson gang?” asked rick.
“a crowd of men, led by a man named deck lawson,” answered uncle tod. “they make a speciality of jumping claims and stealing mines, and i suppose they must have heard that we had a good thing here as long as we could have lost river working for us.”
“then they went to work and stole a river instead of taking a mine,” said sam.
“they might just as well have taken the mine as to cut off our water,” observed uncle tod. “the mine can’t be worked to advantage without water, and we haven’t been able to locate any other prospect around here that’s anywhere near as good.”
“no, and we never will,” declared sam, with a return of his former gloom, that had vanished for a time on the receipt of the good news.
“but you say lost river can be turned back, boys?” asked uncle tod.
“yes,” answered rick, and he and chot proceeded to go more into details over the plan of the dam and the water gates. rick made a drawing of it and showed his first sketch. when they had finished uncle tod said:
“sam, we’ve got to turn that river! we just naturally have to!”
“sure thing!” assented mr. rockford.
“come on!” cried rick with shining eyes. “we can make the place before night and open our gates and close theirs. come on!”
“easy, boy, easy!” counseled his uncle. “how many men did you say were there in camp?”
“oh, about a dozen,” answered rick. “wouldn’t you say that many, chot?”
“i reckon so. maybe ten or eleven, anyhow.”
rick looked at uncle tod expectantly.
“and you expect that we two men and two boys can go up against a dozen hard-shelled members of the lawson gang?” asked mr. belmont with a quizzical smile.
“we got ruddy, too,” asserted chot.
“yes, son, but we don’t want ruddy to get hurt and i don’t want you boys to go back east in bandages,” said uncle tod. “no, we’ll do this thing in regular order and with the law on our side. i know the law will be on my side for i have papers to show that i own the rights to lost river.”
“well, let’s get busy then,” suggested sam. “will you go down to bitter sweet gulch and tell the sheriff and get a gang to come back and clean out this lawson crowd?”
“i will,” said uncle tod. “i’ll take my papers with me, see a lawyer, if there’s one in town, and then we’ll start lost river back where she belongs.”
“want us to come and tell what we saw?” asked rick.
“it might be a good plan,” agreed his uncle. “you could give first-hand evidence—both of you. we’ll go right after dinner. you boys have been living on light rations and we’ll have to feed you up a bit.”
seldom had a meal tasted so good, rick and chot thought, as the one sam set before them a little later, and then uncle tod got out the rickety old car that sometimes went and sometimes didn’t. this was one of the times it did, and he and the boys rattled to town in the flivver.
uncle tod located a lawyer, to whom the case was explained, and the legal individual agreed that uncle tod had a right to lost river if it could be turned back into the tunnel where it had flowed for many years.
“we’ll go before the judge and get an order for the sheriff to enforce your claim,” said mr. pitney, the lawyer. “we’ll have something, then, to back us up.”
the proceedings before the judge were brief. rick and chot told what they had seen, uncle tod showed his papers and gave testimony. there was a signing of some documents, a visit to the office of the sheriff and a promise made that the following morning a posse of deputies, well armed, would be at the disposal of uncle tod to see that the orders of the court were carried out; the orders being that lost river was to be turned back into its old channel.
“now we have everything legal and in ship-shape,” said uncle tod as he and the boys rattled back to camp.
sam eagerly awaited their arrival, anxious to hear the news, and when told that the deputies would arrive next morning, and would start for the dam, mr. rockford began cleaning his rusty gun.
“do you think there’ll be a fight?” asked rick.
“i know it!” was the emphatic answer.
“come on, chot,” whispered rick. “we’ll clean our guns, too!”
the boys could hardly wait for morning to come, but it arrived strictly on schedule and almanac time, and soon after breakfast two flivvers loaded with deputy sheriffs rattled into camp.
and now a big disappointment awaited the lads, for, after a conference between the chief deputy and uncle tod, the order was given:
“you lads’ll have to stay in camp!”
“oh, uncle tod!” cried rick. “we just got to go!”
“we want to see the fight—and help!” sang out chot.
“maybe you can’t find the place without us,” added rick, hopefully.
“oh, i reckon we can,” drawled the chief deputy, matt mason by name. “i know where it is—it’s the only location around here where they could turn the stream the way you say they have. i’d like to let you boys come along, but it’s too dangerous.”
but chot and rick looked so sad over the prospect of being left behind that finally, after a talk, it was decided they could ride in the flivver with sam and uncle tod as close to the dam as was considered safe, and could then look on from a hidden vantage point, taking, however, no part in the fight—in case there was one.
“but if that lawson gang gets the best of you, can’t we jump in and help?” asked rick.
“oh, yes, maybe,” said mr. mason slowly, “but i don’t aim to have them get the best of me. i know that bunch!”
so the start was made. owing to the use of autos, necessitating journey by a longer trail than the short one taken by the boys, it was afternoon when they reached the vicinity of the dam. the exact location of the water gates were described by rick and chot and then they, with ruddy, were left in a secluded spot, while uncle tod, sam and the deputy sheriffs went on cautiously to compel the lawson gang to restore the rights they had taken away.
“crickets! i wish we were there!” sighed chot.
“so do i,” agreed rick. “but dad told me that we were to do what uncle tod said.”
“oh, of course we got to do that,” assented chot, trying to be cheerful over it.
the sheriff’s men and uncle tod proceeded with all due caution until they reached the opening of the second tunnel, through which the water should have flowed.
“there’s the dam,” announced uncle tod in a low voice to mr. mason, the two being in the lead.
“i see it, and the gates, too. pretty slick piece of work. but i don’t see any of the gang.”
“nor i!” said uncle tod.
they remained quiet, taking observations. from the camp came not a sound, nor was there any sight of the lawson crowd.
“they may have heard we were coming and be hiding,” said mason.
“trying to ambush us,” agreed uncle tod.
“we’d better be careful. they’re desperate men.”
but mason and his deputies were cunning men, as well as brave, and by scouting around, and by tricks designed to draw the fire of any hidden foe, should there prove to be one, they soon established that the camp was deserted.
“they’ve vamoosed!” exclaimed sam. “they’ve quit and we can turn the river back.”
“it does look so,” agreed mason. “but don’t be in too much of a rush. go slow!”
it was good advice, and was followed. but after another wait and a further cautious scouting around, it was definitely established that not a man was left in camp, though their possessions, scattered about, showed they had not long been away, and also indicated that they had departed in a hurry.
“they heard we were coming and scooted,” said sam exultantly.
“looks so,” agreed uncle tod. “well, now let’s turn back our river where it belongs.”
the mechanism of the water gates was easy to understand, and no trouble was experienced in working it. to uncle tod fell the honor of closing the first gate that shut off the water from the lawson flume.
the stream began to back up behind the dam as other gates were closed.
“better open the second gates now,” suggested sam.
the levers were depressed and the gates, made of heavy planks, slowly came up. under them rushed the water, hissing and foaming.
“hurray!” cried uncle tod, as the stream shot into the tunnel whence it had been diverted. “lost river is back again!”
“good work!” commented mason. he and his men helped in raising the other gates that had been closed for several weeks.
and as lost river was turned back, there came a sudden hail from across the little gully into which the stream had been diverted. a hail full of meaning it was, for a voice said:
“hands up, you fellows! what do you mean coming in here on my mine?”
the men looked up to see, confronting them, a menacing figure of a man armed with a powerful rifle.
“deck lawson!” murmured uncle tod.
“just our luck!” complained sam gloomily.
