Shoe-Bar Stratton

This settled, they passed on to other details, and by the time they reached Paloma, everything had been threshed out and decided, including a possible means of communication in case of emergency.

Ravenously hungry, they sought the ramshackle hotel at once, and though it was long after the regular supper hour, they succeeded in getting a fair meal cooked and served. Concluding that it would be pleasanter all around to give Lynch as much time as possible to recover from his spleen, Bud decided to defer his return to the ranch until early morning. So when they had finished eating, they walked down to the store to arrange for hiring one of Daggett’s horses again. Here they were forced to spend half an hour listening to old Pop’s garrulous comments and the repeated “I told you so,” which greeted the news of Stratton’s move before they could tear themselves away and turn in.

They were up at dawn, ate a hurried breakfast, and then set out along the trail. Where the Rocking-R track branched off they paused for a few casual words of farewell, and then each went his way. A few hundred yards beyond, Buck turned in his saddle just in time to see Jessup, leading Stratton’s old mount, ride briskly into a shallow draw and disappear.

He had a feeling that he was going to miss the youngster, with his cheerful optimism and dependable ways; but he felt that at the most a few weeks would see them together again. Fortunately for his peace of mind, he had not the least suspicion of the circumstances which were to bring about their next meeting.

CHAPTER XIX

THE MYSTERIOUS MOTOR-CAR

Buck took to Jim Tenny at once. There was something about this long, lean, brown-faced foreman of the Rocking-R, with his clear gray eyes and that half-humorous twist to his thin lips, which inspired not only confidence but liking as well. He listened without comment to Buck’s story, which included practically everything save the revelation of his own identity; but once or twice, especially at the brief mention of the fight in the bunk-house, his eyes gleamed with momentary approval. When Buck told about the blackleg incident his face darkened and he spoke for the first time.

“Seems like yuh had him there,” he said briefly. “That job alone ought to land him in the pen.”

Buck nodded. “I know; but I’m afraid he couldn’t be convicted on my evidence alone. Kreeger and Siegrist fixed up a pretty decent alibi, you see, and it would only be my word against theirs. Even the carcass of the beast wouldn’t help much. They’d say it wandered through the pass by itself, and I suppose there’s one chance in a thousand it could have.”

“Damned unlikely, though,” shrugged Tenny.

“Sure; but the law’s that way. You’ve got to be dead certain. Besides, if he was pulled in for that we might never find out just what’s at the bottom of it all. That’s the important thing, and if I can only get a line on what he’s up to, we’ll land him swift enough, believe me!”

Warned by Bud’s unexpected question the evening before that he must have a more plausible motive for following up the case, Buck had coolly appointed himself one of Jim Hardenberg’s deputies. He hinted that rumors of the cattle-stealing had reached the sheriff, who, debarred from taking up the matter openly by the absence of any complaint from the owner of the Shoe-Bar, had dispatched Stratton on a secret investigation. The process of that investigation having disclosed evidences of rascality of which the rustling was but a minor feature, Stratton’s desire to probe the mystery to the bottom seemed perfectly natural, and the need for secrecy was also accounted for. The only risk Buck ran was of Tenny’s mentioning the matter to Hardenberg himself, and that seemed slight enough. At the worst it would merely mean anticipating a little; for if he did succeed in solving the problem of Tex Lynch’s motives, the next and final step would naturally be up to the sheriff.

“I get yuh,” said Tenny, nodding. “That’s true enough. Well, what do you want me to do?”

Buck told him briefly, and the foreman’s eyes twinkled.

“That’s some order,” he commented.

“I’d pay you for the stock and grub, of course,” Stratton assured him; “and at least put up a deposit for the cayuses.”

“Oh, that part ain’t frettin’ me none. I reckon I can trust yuh. I was thinkin’ about how I could stall off Lynch in case he comes around askin’ questions. Yuh want he should get the idea I hired yuh?”

“I thought it would ease his mind and give him the notion I was safe for a while,” smiled Stratton. “Of course you could say I tried for a job but you were full up.”

“That would be easier,” agreed Tenny. “I could keep my mouth shut, but I couldn’t guarantee about the boys. They wouldn’t say nothin’ a-purpose, but like as not if they should meet up with one of that slick crowd at the Shoe-Bar they’d let somethin’ slip without thinkin’. On the other hand, it sure would make him a mite careless if he thought yuh was tied down here on a reg’lar job.”

He paused reflectively; then suddenly his eyes brightened.

“I got it,” he chuckled. “I’ll send you down to help Gabby Smith at Red Butte camp. That’s ’way to hell and gone down at the south end of the outfit, where nobody goes from here more’n about once in six months. Gabby’s one of these here solitary guys that’s sorta soured on the world in gen’al, an’ don’t hardly open his face except to take in grub, but yuh can trust him. Jest tell him what yuh want and he’ll do it, providin’ yuh don’t hang around the camp too long. Gabby does hate company worse’n a dose of poison.”

Tenny lost no time in carrying out his plans. He hunted out a few simple cooking-utensils and enough canned goods and other stores to last two weeks, picked a pack-animal and a riding horse, and by dinner-time had everything ready for Buck to start immediately afterward.

The six or seven cow-punchers who responded to the gong presented a marked and pleasant contrast to the Shoe-Bar outfit. They greeted Stratton with some brevity, but after the first pangs of hunger had been assuaged and they learned where he was bound for, they expanded, and Buck was the object of much joking commiseration on the prospect before him.

“You’ll sure have one wild time,” grinned a dark-haired, blue-eyed youngster called Broncho. “Gabby’s about as sociable as a rattler. I wouldn’t change places with yuh for no money.”

No one seemed to suspect any ulterior motive beneath the plan, and when Buck rode off about one o’clock, leading his pack-horse, his spirits rose insensibly at the ease with which things seemed to be working out.

He reached Red Butte camp in a little more than three hours and found the adobe shack deserted. It was similar in size and construction to Las Vegas, but there all likeness ceased, for the interior was surprisingly comfortable and as spick-and-span as the Shoe-Bar line camp was cluttered and dirty. Everything was so immaculate, in fact, that Buck had a moment of hesitation about flicking his cigarette ashes on the floor, and banished his scruples mainly because he had never heard of a cow-man dropping them anywhere else.

Gabby appeared about an hour later, a tall, stooping man of uncertain middle age, with a cold eye and a perpetual, sour droop to his lids. At the sight of Buck the sourness became accentuated and increased still more when he observed the ashes on the floor. His only reply to Stratton’s introduction of himself was a grunt and Buck lost no time in easing the fellow’s mind of any fear of a prolonged spell of company.

Even then Gabby’s gloom scarcely lightened. He listened, however, to Stratton’s brief explanation and in a few gruff words agreed that in the unlikely event of any inquiry he would say that the new hand was off riding fence or something of the sort. Then he swept out the offending ashes and proceeded methodically to get supper, declining any assistance from his visitor.

His manner was so dispiriting that Buck was thankful when the silent meal was over, and even more so an hour later to spread his blankets in one of the spare bunks and turn in. His relief at getting away early the next morning was almost as great as Gabby’s could be to see him go.

It was late in the afternoon, after a careful circuit of the southern end of the Shoe-Bar, that Buck reached the foothills. Bud had told him of a spring to the northwest of Las Vegas camp, but the rough traveling decided him to camp that night on the further side of the creek. In the morning he went on through a wilderness of arroyos, cañons, and gullies that twisted endlessly between the barren hills, and made him realize how simple it would be for any number of men and cattle to evade pursuit in this wild country.

Fortunately Jessup’s directions had been explicit, and toward noon Buck found the spring at the bottom of a small cañon and proceeded to unpack and settle down. Bud himself had discovered the place by accident, and as far as Stratton could judge it was not a likely spot to be visited either by the Shoe-Bar hands or their Mexican confederates. A wide, overhanging ledge provided shelter for himself, and there was plenty of forage in sight for the two horses. Taken all in all, it was as snug a retreat as any one could wish, and Buck congratulated himself on having such safe and secluded headquarters from which to carry on his investigations.

These first took him southward, and for five days he rode through the hills, traversing gullies and cañons, and spying out the whole country generally, in a systematic effort to find the route taken by the rustlers in driving off their booty.

Once he found the spot where they had taken to the hills, the rest was comparatively simple. There were a number of signs to guide him, including the bodies of two animals bearing the familiar brand, and he succeeded in tracing the thieves to a point on the edge of a stretch of desert twenty miles or more below the Shoe-Bar land. About twelve miles beyond lay another range of hills, which would give them cover until they were within a short distance of the border.

“A dozen good fellows stationed here,” thought Stratton, critically surveying the gully behind him, “would catch them without any trouble. There’s no other way I’ve seen of getting out with a bunch of cattle.”

Having settled this point to his satisfaction, Buck’s mind veered swiftly – with an odd sense of relief that now at last he could investigate the matter seriously – to the other problem which had stirred his curiosity so long.

When his attention was first attracted to the north pasture by Bud’s account of Andrew Thorne’s tragic death, its connection with the mystery of the ranch seemed trivial. But for some reason the thing stuck in his mind, returning again and again with a teasing persistence and gaining each time in significance. From much thinking about it, Buck could almost reconstruct the scene, with its familiar, humdrum background of bawling calves, lowing mothers, dust, hot irons, swearing, sweating men, and all the other accompaniments of the spring branding. That was the picture into which Thorne had suddenly ridden, his face stamped with an excitement in marked contrast to his usual phlegmatic calm. In his mind’s eye Stratton could see him clutch Tex Lynch and draw him hastily to one side, could imagine vividly the low-voiced conversation that followed, the hurried saddling of a fresh horse, and the swift departure of the two northward – to what?

Buck had asked himself that question a hundred times. Three hours had passed before the return of Lynch alone, with the shocking news – time enough to ride twice the distance to north pasture and back again. Where had the interval been passed, and how?

Stratton realized that they might easily have changed their direction, once they were out of sight of the men. They might have gone eastward toward the ranch-house – which they had not – or westward into the mountains. Once or twice Buck considered the possibility of the old man’s having stumbled on a rich lode of precious metal. But as far as he knew no trace of gold had ever been found in these mountains. Moreover, though Lynch was perfectly capable of murdering his employer for that knowledge, his next logical move would have been an immediate taking up of the claims, instead of which he remained quietly on the ranch to carry on his slow and secret plotting.

Stratton long ago dismissed that possibility. There remained only the north pasture, and the longer he considered it the more he became convinced that Thorne had met his death there, and that the chances were strong that somewhere in those wastes of worthless desert land lay the key to the whole enthralling mystery.

Buck was so eager to start his investigations that it irked him to have to spend the few remaining hours of the afternoon in idleness. But as he knew that the undertaking would take a full day or even longer, he possessed his soul with patience and made arrangements for an early start next morning.

The dawn was just breaking when he left camp mounted on Pete, the Rocking-R horse that he had found so reliable in the rough country. The simplest and most direct way would have been to descend to level ground and ride along the edge of the Shoe-Bar land. But he dared not take any chances of being observed by Lynch or his gang, and was forced to make a long detour through the hills.

The way was difficult and roundabout. Frequently he was turned back by blind cañons or gullies which had no outlet, and there were few places where the horse could go faster than a walk. To Buck’s impatient spirit it was all tiresome and exasperating, and he had moments of wondering whether he was ever going to get anywhere.

Finally, about the middle of the afternoon, he was cheered for the first time by an unexpected glimpse of his goal. For several miles he had been following a rough trail which wound around the side of a steep, irregular hill. Coming out abruptly on a little plateau, with the tumbled rocks rising at his back, there spread out suddenly before him to the east a wide, extended sweep of level country.

At first he could scarcely believe that the sandy stretch below him was the north pasture he was seeking. But swiftly he realized that the threadlike line a little to the south must be the fence dividing the desert from the fertile portions of the Shoe-Bar, and he even thought he recognized the corner where the infected steer had been driven through. With an exclamation of satisfaction he was reaching for his field-glasses when of a sudden a strange, slowly-moving shape out in the desert caught his attention and riveted it instantly.

For a few seconds Buck thought his eyes were playing tricks. Amazed, incredulous, forgetting for an instant the field-glasses in his hand, he stared blankly from under squinting lids at the incredible object that crawled lurchingly through the shimmering, glittering desert atmosphere.

“I’m dotty!” he muttered at length. “It can’t be!”

Then, remembering the glasses, he raised them hastily to his eyes and focused them with a twist or two of practised fingers.

He was neither crazy nor mistaken. Drawn suddenly out of its blurred obscurity by the powerful lenses, there sprang up before Buck’s eyes, sharp and clear in every detail, a big gray motor-car that moved slowly but steadily, with many a bump and sidewise lurch, diagonally across the cactus-sprinkled desert below him.

CHAPTER XX

CATASTROPHE

The discovery galvanized Stratton into instant, alert attention. Motor-cars were rare in this remote range country and confined almost solely to the sort of “flivver” which is not entirely dependent on roads. The presence in the north pasture of this powerful gray machine, which certainly did not belong in the neighborhood, was more than significant, and Buck tried at once to get a view of the occupants.

In this he was not successful. There were three of them, one in the driver’s seat and two others in the tonneau. But the top prevented more than a glimpse of the latter, while the cap and goggles of the chauffeur left visible only a wedge of brick-red, dust-coated skin, a thin, prominent nose and a wisp of wiry black mustache.

One thing was certain – the fellow knew his job. Under his masterly guidance the big car plowed steadily through the clogging sand, avoiding obstructions or surmounting them with the least possible expenditure of power, never once stalled, and, except for a necessary slight divergence now and then, held closely to its northwesterly course across the desert.

Buck, who had driven under the worst possible battle-front conditions, fully appreciated the coaxing, the general manœuvering, the constant delicate manipulation of brake and throttle necessary to produce this result. But his admiration of the fellow’s skill was swiftly swallowed up in eager curiosity and speculation.

Who were they? What were they doing here? Where were they going? At first he had a momentary fear lest they should see him perched up here on his point of vantage. Then he realized that the backing of rocks prevented his figure from showing against the skyline, which, together with the distance and the clouds of dust stirred up by the car itself, made the danger almost negligible. So he merely dismounted and, leaning against his horse, kept the glasses riveted on the slowly moving machine.

The car advanced steadily until it reached a point about a quarter of a mile from the rough ground and a little distance north of where Buck stood. Then it stopped, and a capped and goggled head was thrust out of the tonneau. Buck could make out nothing definite about the face save that it was smooth-shaven and rather heavy-jowled. He was hoping that the fellow would alight from the car and show himself more plainly but to his disappointment the head was presently drawn back and the machine crept on, swerving a little so that it headed almost due north.

Ten minutes later it halted again, and this time the two men got out and walked slowly over the sand. Both were clad in long dust-coats, and one seemed stouter and heavier than the other. Unfortunately they were too far beyond the carrying power of the binoculars to get anything more clearly, and Buck swore and fretted and strained his eyes in vain. After a delay of nearly an hour, he saw the car start again, and followed its blurred image until it finally disappeared beyond an out-thrust spur well to the northward.

Stratton lowered his glasses and stood for a moment or two rubbing his cramped arm absently. His face was thoughtful, with a glint of excitement in his eyes. Presently his shoulders straightened resolutely.

“Anyhow, I can follow the tracks of the tires and find out what they’ve been up to,” he muttered.

The difficulty was to descend from his rocky perch, and it proved to be no small one. He might have clambered down the face of the cliff, but that would mean abandoning his horse. In the end he was forced to retrace his steps along the twisting ledge by which he had come.

From his knowledge of the country to the south, Buck had started out with the idea that it would be simple enough to reach the flats through one of the many gullies and cañons that fringed the margin of the hills further down. He had not counted on the fact that as the range widened it split into two distinct ridges, steep and declivitous on the outer edges, with the space between them broken up into a network of water-worn gullies and arroyos.

“I ought to have known from the look of the north pasture that all the water goes the other way,” he grumbled. “Best thing I can do is to head for that trail Bud spoke of that cuts through to the T-T ranch. It can’t be so very far north.”

It wasn’t, as the crow flies, but Buck was no aviator. He was forced to take a most tortuous, roundabout route, and when he finally emerged on the first passable track heading approximately in the right direction, the sun was low and there seemed little chance of his accomplishing his purpose in the few hours of daylight remaining.

Still, he kept on. At least he was mapping out a route which would be easily and swiftly followed another time. And if darkness threatened, he could return to his little camp through the open Shoe-Bar pastures, where neither Lynch nor his men were at all likely to linger after dusk.

The trail followed a natural break in the hills and, though not especially difficult under foot, was twisting and irregular, full of sharp descents and equally steep upward slopes. Buck had covered about two miles and was growing impatient when he came to the hardest climb he had yet encountered and swung himself out of the saddle.

“No use killing you, Pete, to save a little time,” he commented, giving the horse’s sweaty neck a slap. “I’d like to know how the devil those two ever drove a steer through here.”

It did seem as if this must have been uncommonly difficult. The trail curved steeply around the side of a hill, following a ledge similar to the one Buck had taken earlier in the afternoon with such interesting results. There was width enough for safety, but on one side the rocks rose sharply to the summit of the hill, while on the other there was a sheer drop into a gulch below, which, at the crown of the slope, must have been fifty or sixty feet at least.

Leading the horse, Buck plodded on in a rather discouraged fashion until he had covered about three-quarters of the distance to the top. Then of a sudden his pace quickened, as a bend in the trail revealed hopeful glimpses of open spaces ahead. It was nothing really definite – merely a falling away of the hills on either side and a wide expanse of unobstructed sky beyond, but it made him feel that he was at last coming out of this rocky wilderness. A moment or two later he gained the summit of the slope and his eyes brightened as they rested on the section of sandy, cactus-dotted country spread out below him.

A dozen feet ahead the trail curved sharply around a rocky buttress, which hid the remainder of it from view. In his eagerness to see what lay beyond, Stratton did not mount but led his horse over the short stretch of level rock. But as he turned the corner, he caught his breath and jerked back on Pete’s reins.

By one of those freaks of nature that are often so surprising, the trail led straight down to level ground with almost the regularity of some work of engineering. At the foot of it stood the gray motor-car – empty!

The sight of it, and especially that unnatural air of complete desertion, instantly aroused in Buck a sense of acute danger. He turned swiftly to retreat, and caught a glimpse of a figure crouching in a little rocky niche almost at his elbow.

There was no time to leap back or forward; no time even to stir. Already the man’s arm was lifted, and though Stratton’s hand jerked automatically to his gun, he was too late.

An instant later something struck his head with crushing force and crumpled him to the ground.

When Buck began to struggle out of that black, bottomless abyss of complete oblivion, he thought at first – as soon as he could think at all – that he was lying in his bunk back at the Shoe-Bar. What gave him the idea he could not tell. His head throbbed painfully, and his brain seemed to swim in a vague, uncertain mist. A deadly lassitude gripped him, making all movement, even to the lifting of his eyelids, an exertion too great to be considered.

But presently, when his brain had cleared a little, he became aware of voices. One in particular seemed, even in his dreamlike state, to sting into his consciousness with a peculiar, bitter instinct of hatred. When at length he realized that it was the voice of Tex Lynch, the discovery had a curiously reviving effect upon his dazed senses. He could not yet remember what had happened, but intuitively he associated his helplessness with the foreman’s presence, and that same instinct caused him to make a desperate attempt to understand what the man was saying. At first the fellow’s words seemed blurred and broken, but little by little their meaning grew clearer to the injured man.

“… ain’t safe … suspects somethin’ … snoopin’ around ever since … thought he was up to somethin’ … saw him up on that ledge watchin’ yuh … dead sure. I had a notion he’d ride around to this trail, ’cause it’s the only way down to north pasture. I tell yuh, Paul, he’s wise, an’ he’ll spill the beans sure. We got to do it.”

“I don’t like it, I tell you!” protested a shrill, high-pitched voice querulously. “I can’t stand blood.”