“Struck out for old Mexico, prospecting for gold, three months ago,” replied Bill.  “Why?”

“That’s his brother Hans, who has come from Berlin to visit him,” returned Tom.  And hurriedly he gave an outline of the German lad’s story.

“Phew!  Chicken-hearted, is he?” commented Horace.  “It won’t do to leave him in Tolopah.  Luckily one of our men is in town with our grub wagon.  He can ride out to the ranch with him.”

When Tom imparted this information to Hans, the poor fellow was delighted and asked where he could find the outfit.

“I’ll show him.  You all ride on,” said Horace.  But the others refused, declaring they would all go together.

As the cavalcade started with Hans and his valises trying to keep up with them, many were the jests and laughs cast after them.

But the boys paid them no heed, and in a few minutes the German youth was safe in the provision wagon.

Putting their horses into a brisk canter, the four lads set out for the ranch.

Many were the questions the Wilders asked about their friends back in Ohio, and so busy were Tom and Larry in answering, and in relating all the events of consequence that had transpired since the family had left Bramley two years before, that the twenty miles which lay between Tolopah and the ranch seemed scarcely one.

CHAPTER V

THE HALF-MOON RANCH

As the boys drew rein in front of the broad, vine-covered piazza of the ranch house they were greeted by Mr. and Mrs. Wilder,

“Well, it does seem good to see some one from home,” exclaimed the latter as she shook the hands of Tom and Larry.

“It sure does,” asserted her husband.  “Wish you’d brought your father and mother with you.  What in the world started them off to Scotland?”

Quickly the brothers explained.

“Well, well!  So Uncle Darwent really had some money,” commented Mrs. Wilder.  “I’m real glad, though of course it isn’t as though your father needed any more.  I should have thought you boys would have wanted to go with them.”

“Not when we could spend the summer on your ranch,” returned Larry.  “But we began to be afraid we would be obliged to go, and we should have if the telegram had been any later.  No time ever seemed so long as when we were waiting for your answer.”

“It was just luck we got your message,” declared Horace.  “Sometimes we don’t go to town for a week.  But something seemed to urge me to ride in the other morning, and when I arrived Con Brown hollered to me he had a telegram.  When I read it, I didn’t lose any time answering, and I made Con promise to rush it.”

“Con’s our telegraph operator,” explained Bill.  “Come on in and change your duds and then we’ll look the ranch over.”

Nothing loath to remove their clothes, which still smelled of engine smoke, despite their ride over the plains, as the brothers seized their suitcases and followed their young hosts, Larry exclaimed laughingly: