"Rosemary did it all," Floyd said with a cheerful grin. "It was just a bluff!" and he told the story.

"Nerviest thing I ever heard of!" complimented Captain Marshall.

"Heap good squaw!" was Buck Tooth's opinion, and that seemed to sum it all up.

The prisoners secured, the dead on both sides buried and the story of the capture and rescue briefly told, arrangements were made for returning to civilization.

The raid of the Yaquis was over, and so severe was the lesson taught them that it was many years before another trick like that was tried.

Rosemary and Floyd, though they had suffered many hardships, were not physically harmed, except for the youth's wrenched arm, which was painful but not dangerous.

"Oh, but we want some water to wash in!" Rosemary confided to Bud.

"They've kept us so much on the go, ever since they captured us, that I can't bear to think of it. I just _dreamed_ of clean bath tubs filled with white soap suds!"

"We'll soon be at the ranch," Bud said.

"Oh, but I can't wait until then."

"Same here!" put in Floyd. "I don't believe a Yaqui touches water from the time he's born until he dies."

In order to give everyone a chance to rest, it was decided to camp for a few days in a favorable spot, which was found a few miles from where the Indians had made their last stand--a final stand for many, as more than a dozen were killed.

The others were sent back under guard as prisoners, Mike among them, scowling blackly as he was led away. A scout was sent to the nearest place where there was a telegraph station, to send the good news back to Diamond X.

"And now we can take it easy," observed Bud as he with his cowboy cousins and the newly rescued captives enjoyed the first real meal without antic.i.p.ations of a fight immediately after it.

"You must have had a dreadful time, Rosemary," said d.i.c.k, whose arm was in a sling.

"Well, it seemed so at the time, and yet I want to laugh when I think how I fooled those Indians just by screaming."

"It isn't the first time you've brought help by screaming!" laughed Bud. "I remember once when I tried to kiss you--"

"Tut! Tut!" laughed Rosemary. "That's past history."

And so, in time, was the raid of the Yaquis. In due season Rosemary and her brother, with our boy heroes reached Diamond X, parting from the soldier escort. And once at the ranch, which had been their objective before the kidnapping, the visitors were royally entertained.

"Well, it was the best adventure we ever had," declared Nort, and his brother agreed with him. But it was not to be the last of the exciting happenings in which they were to be involved.

For these were lads of action, ever in the van when there was a chance for a fight. And those who wish to follow the further adventures of Bud, Nort and d.i.c.k, may do so in the next volume of this series, which will be ent.i.tled "The Boy Ranchers in the Flood; or Saving the Stock at Diamond X."

In that we shall see how they fared when again called on to act their parts in the face of danger. But, for the present we shall leave them to enjoy the company of Rosemary and Floyd at Diamond X and in Happy Valley.

THE END