"This is about as bad as that tornado we encountered in Africa,"
observed Sam, as he crouched close to his brothers.  "Don't you
remember it and how the lightning struck that baobab tree?"

Yes, both remembered it well.  "It was awful," said Tom.  "I hope
the lightning doesn't come near us here."

If anything, the rain now came down heavier than before, until Jack
Wumble declared it to be the greatest downpour he had ever
witnessed in that section of the country.  The water leaped over
the rocks in tiny waterfalls, and soon Larkspur Creek became a
raging torrent.  The sky was inky black, and they could not see a
dozen paces in any direction.

Suddenly a strange rumble reached their ears, a rumble that made
both Wumble and Slim Jim turn pale and look at each other with
faces full of fear.  The rumble rose and fell, shaking the earth
beneath them, and mingling with a grinding and crashing and ripping
that seemed to strike each one to the very heart.

"What is it?  The end of the world?" gasped Sam.

"A landslide," answered Wumble.  "Please God, it doesn't come this
way!"

They waited, and the next half-minute seemed an eternity.  The
ground continued to tremble beneath them, and the rumble kept
coming closer and closer.  "We are doomed!" wailed Tom, but then
the rumble and crashing passed them by and was slowly lost in the
distance, until with one last crash it came to a sudden end.

"It's over!" said Slim Jim.  "Thank Heaven, we escaped it!"

"You are sure it was a landslide?" asked Dick, when he felt able to
speak.

"Yes, my lad, and a putty big one, too.  Somewhar along this
mountain side you will find a furrow cut down to the creek, an'
find thet tons an' tons o' stone and dirt have slid down fer
quarter o' a mile or more.  Perhaps the slide has filled up the
creek entirely."

The rain continued to come down, now drowning out every other
sound.  But wet as it was, Wumble urged that they go still higher
up the mountain, to escape any other landslide that might be
imminent.

So up they toiled until a large table rock was gained.  At this
point a second rock gave them shelter, and here they remained
throughout the whole of one of the most disagreeable nights the
Rover boys had ever encountered.

The storm and the landslide had driven away all thoughts of
surrounding the Baxters and Roebuck, but with the coming of morning
the skies cleared, and they felt as if they must do as originally
planned.

"Unless the landslide paid 'em off," said Jack Wumble.

"Do you think they were caught in it?" asked Dick.

"No tellin', lad, until we locate the slide."

To locate the landslide was not difficult, since it had passed to
their right.  They soon made out its trail, which moved down to the
creek in a zigzag fashion.  Sure enough the creek was partly filled
with the debris, and here the opposite bank was overflowed to the
extent of several acres.

"We may find some rich deposits down thar," said Wumble.  "A
landslide sometimes provides a harvest for prospectors."

They moved on cautiously until they came to the spot where the
Baxters and Roebuck had been seen last.  Here the landslide had
been at its worst, and rocks and trees had been torn up and cast
down as by a giant's hand.  Not a trace of the enemy was to be
discovered, until Jack Wumble at last made out a part of a man's
coat lying a hundred feet away.  They ran to the spot, and soon
uncovered the lifeless form of Roebuck.  The man had been literally
mauled to death by the fury of the elements.

"Poor fellow!" murmured Tom, as he gazed at the remains.  "It was a
dreadful death to die!"

"Yes, and he probably wasn't prepared for it," said Dick soberly.
"I wonder if the Baxters were caught, too?"

"More'n likely," put in Wumble.  "Look, here is a man's hat."

"Arnold Baxter's hat," cried Tom.  "I noted it particularly when I
was their prisoner.  Where can the man be?"

"There are tons an' tons o' loose dirt just be low here," said Slim
Jim.  "Ye see the ground turned over and over as it rolled.
Probably both o' the Baxters are under that dirt, mebbe twenty or
thirty foot down."

At this all of the Rover boys shuddered.  Very likely the old
hunter spoke the truth.  What a terrible fate for their old
enemies!

"Let us go away," whispered Sam.  "I can't stand this any longer!"
And he rushed off with the tears standing in his eyes.  The others
were also affected, and glad enough to leave the place, once and
forever.  Wumble and Slim Jim threw Roebuck's body into a hollow
and placed some dirt over it, and then built up a little mound of
stones to mark the spot.

It was not until the next day that the party returned to the creek and
began to look up the Eclipse Mine once more.  The landslide had cut
across this, and it was not long before both Wumble and Slim Jim
declared the ground to be full of good paying "dirt," to use their own
term.  The claim was staked out to the boys' satisfaction, and then
Wumble staked out a claim just above Discovery, as it is called in
mining laws, while Slim Jim staked out one for himself just below
Discovery.  All three claims ran to both sides of the creek, so that
no one would suffer for water when mining operations should begin.

"And those claims will yield us thousands of dollars!" said Jack
Wumble.  "Boys, we will all be rich."

"Hurrah!" shouted Tom.  "I'm glad I came West, after all."

"And so am I," said Sam.  "Dick, what do you say?"

"I say hurrah for the Eclipse Mine, and all the gold it will bring
us," answered Dick.  "Won't father be pleased when he learns the
news?"

Here let us bring to a close the story of the Rover boys' trip out
West.  They had faced many grave perils, but one after another
these perils had been surmounted, and now, when success had finally
crowned their efforts, all the hardships were forgotten.

 In due course of time the title to the Eclipse Mine was
established in law, and later on Anderson Rover sent out a body of
skilled miners to work the claim for all it was worth.  It proved
to be as valuable as anticipated, and the Rovers were, of course,
correspondingly happy.

The claims staked out by Jack Wumble and by Slim Jim proved also to
be good payers from the start.

When the boys got home they found that the story of the Baxters'
fate had preceded them.  Many folks were inclined to think that the
wrongdoers deserved the catastrophe which had overtaken them.  As
nothing was heard of either father or son for a long while, it was
presumed that both were dead beyond a doubt.

But they were not dead, although terribly bruised and unable to do
much for themselves for a long while.  The landslide threw both
into the creek, and when they came to their senses they were fully
a mile from the scene of the disaster.  Here they fell in with a
body of miners from Canada, and these men took them to a settlement
still further West, where Arnold Baxter hovered between life and
death for many weeks.  Dan recovered more quickly.

"It's the Rovers' fault," growled Dan Baxter, when he was able to
sit up.  "I'll fix them yet."

He had still many plans for the future, and what some of them were
will be told in the next volume of the series, to be entitled "The
Rover Boys on the Great Lakes; or, The Secret of the Island Cave."
In this volume we will meet all of our old friends again, and also
learn what was done by the Rover boys to outwit their old enemy.

Yet all went well for the present.  Randolph Rover had quite
recovered, so the boys' Aunt Martha was happy.  Anderson Rover
could now walk around again as well as ever.

"Never saw such boys in my life!" declared Martha Rover.  "No
matter what scrape they get into, they always come out with colors
flying.  God bless 'em every one!"

And to this, kind reader, let us say Amen, and bid each other
good-by.


THE END