“All ready, Massa Tom.  But I mus’ say dat I’d radder hab Boomerang dan dish yeah animal what I’m ridin’.”

“Oh, you’ll do all right, Rad.  Then, if we’re all ready, forward march!” cried Tom, and with calls to their animals, the drivers started them off.

Hardly had they begun the advance than Ned, who had been narrowly watching one of the natives, hurried up to Tom, and rapidly whispered something to his chum.

“What?” cried Tom.  “Armed with a six-shooter, is he?  Well, we’ll see about that!  Halt!” he cried in Spanish, and then he called San Pedro the head mule driver, to him.

CHAPTER X

A WILD HORSE STAMPEDE

“Who is that man?” demanded Tom pointing to the one Ned had indicated.  Tom’s chum had had a glimpse of a shining revolver in the hip pocket of one of the mule drivers, and knowing that the simple natives were not in the habit of carrying such weapons, the lad had communicated his suspicions to Tom.

“What man, senor?” asked the head mule driver.

“That one!” and the young inventor again pointed toward him.  And, now that Tom looked a second time he saw that the man was not as black as the other drivers—­not an honest, dark-skinned black but more of a sickly yellow, like a treacherous half-breed.  “Who is he?” asked Tom, for the man in question was just then tightening a girth and could not hear him.

“I know not, senor.  He come to me when I am hiring the others, and he say he is a good driver.  And so he is, I test him before I engage him,” went in San Pedro in Spanish.  “He is one good driver.”

“Why does he carry a revolver?”

“A revolver, senor?  Santa Maria, I know not!  I—­”

“I’ll find out,” declared Tom determinedly.  “Here,” he called to the offending one, who straightened up quickly.  “Come here!”

The man came, with all the cringing servility of a born native, and bowed low.

“Why have you a weapon?” asked the young inventor.  “I gave orders that none of the drivers were to carry them.”

“A revolver, senor?  I have none!  I—­”

“Rad, reach in his pocket!” cried Tom, and the colored man did so with a promptness that the other could not frustrate.  Eradicate held aloft a large calibre, automatic weapon.

“What’s that for?” asked Tom, virtuously angry.

“I—­er—­I—­” and then, with a hopeless shrug of his shoulders the man turned away.

“Give him his gun, and get another driver, San Pedro,” directed our hero, and with another shrug of his shoulders the man accepted the revolver, and walked slowly off.  Another driver was not hard to engage, as several had been hanging about, hoping for employment at the last minute, and one was quickly chosen.

“It’s lucky you saw that gun, Ned,” remarked Tom, when they were actually under way again.

“Yes, I saw the sun shining on it as his coat flapped up.  What was his game, do you suppose?”