Cobre is the last outpost of civilization.

South of here, in the whole strip from Comobabi to the Colorado River, there's not twenty men, all told, between here and the Mexican border--except yonder deluded wretches in the Gavilan; and none beyond the border for a hundred miles." "It is certainly one big lonesome needle-in-the-haystack proposition--and no one has any idea where our find is, not within three days' ride.

But what puzzles me is this: If Zurich really got wise to our copper, he'd know at once that it was a big thing, if there was any amount of it.

Then why didn't he keep it private and confidential?
Why tip it off to the G.P.?
I have always understood that in robbery and murder, one is assisted only by intimate friends.

What is the large idea ?" "That, I take it," laughed Pete, "is, in some part, an acknowledgment that it doesn't take many like you and me to make a dozen.