Boy Scouts on the Open Plains; The Round-Up Not Ordered

Jimmy had gone to sleep immediately he lay down, for he never knew the time when he could not forget his troubles in sweet slumber. Once or twice he managed to get on his back and aroused Ned by his heavy breathing. On these occasions the scout master was in the habit of giving the offender a sharp punch in the ribs and it seemed as though Jimmy understood what was wanted, even in his sleep, for he would inevitably turn over on his side.

Ned had just been through the third experience of this kind and was wondering whether he had not better suggest that they always tie Jimmy in a certain position as he lay down to sleep, when he heard a voice close by.

As Ned instantly sat up he recognized the tones as belonging to Pard Jack, who was evidently laying down the law to some party:

“Hold up your hands, you there in the bushes, and step right up to the fire, or I’ll shoot; and, let me tell you, this gun goes straight! Lively now, Mister, and no foolishness! Oh! Ned! come here, will you? We’ve got a visitor!”

CHAPTER VIII.

AN UNWELCOME GUEST

When Ned started toward the spot where he knew Jack was on guard, he could hear Harry groping for his rifle, and this told him the other would also be close on his heels. Harry, finding that Jimmy still slumbered peacefully, managed to give him a severe poke in the ribs as he passed that had an immediate effect.

“Here, who’s doin’ that now?” broke from Jimmy’s lips, and then, no doubt, he suddenly realized that there was something up, for he saw Ned poking the fire, holding his gun in the other hand, and Harry also standing erect, armed in the same manner.

Accordingly, Jimmy made haste to discover his gun and follow after them. In the meantime, the dusky figure among the bushes which Jack was covering had stood erect and started to advance toward the fire, as ordered, holding his hands high above his head.

“It’s Harkness!” cried out the kid puncher, who had been on his feet about as soon as Ned; and, somehow, no one was much surprised at the information thus conveyed.

Ned saw that Harkness was just about such a looking man as one might picture if asked to describe a wolf-raiser. He had grayish hair and a scraggy beard; his face was ugly, and his eyes, like those of a rat for keenness and audacity. Taken in all, he was as tough looking a character as the scouts had run across in many a day.

“Wot d’ye mean a holdin’ a man up thisaway, when he jest natrally draps in to arsk who killed them pets o’ his’n?” the wolf-herder blurted out, though careful not to take his hands down, for he knew that Jack was still covering him with that dangerous looking repeating rifle, and there was an air of business about the weapon that warned him not to get careless.

“Oh! you can lower your hands now, if you want,” Jack sang out, “because we’re all on deck and could riddle your hide with lead if you tried to use your gun. So just take things easy now, Mr. Harkness, if that’s your name.”

“It air!” growled the man, staring hard at each boy in turn, as though he did not know what to make of their khaki uniforms and was a little afraid he had run up against a detachment of United States regulars.

“And I reckon then that all these dead wolves belonged to you?” Ned went on to remark, as he swept his hand around.

The man said something hard under his breath.

“Ye gone an’ busted up my bizness, thet’s wot ye done, w’en ye laid out tuh kill the animiles!” he complained, as he gritted his yellow teeth very much as one of the wounded wolves had done at Ned’s approach.

“That couldn’t be helped, Harkness,” the scout master told him. “Your wolves had broken out, and you couldn’t expect to ever trap many of them again, at the best. They came at us like fury, and we had to defend ourselves, or we’d have been torn to pieces like a flash. And that’s why this happened. We weren’t out hunting for trouble; but you’ve lost you pack on account of a weak place in your pen.”

“But ain’t yuh meanin’ tuh pay me anything fo’ shootin’ up my pets thisaways?” Harkness demanded, trying to look fierce, though keeping an eye on Jack with his ready gun.

Jimmy laughed out very loud.

“Would you be after hearing the nerve of him, fellers?” he exclaimed in derision. ’Tis meself that thinks it sounds like adding insult to injury. After lettin’ the pack loose to make a square meal from us, then askin’ pay, because we had to fight to save our precious lives. ’Tis a rare joke, it is – not on your tintype, Mister Harkness. Our principle is ‘millions for defense, not a plunk for tribute.’ So put that in your pipe and smoke it.“

“You’ve got a lot of assurance, Harkness,” Ned told him, severely, “to think of asking such a thing. Why, the boot is on the other foot, and we ought to be demanding that you pay us back for all the ammunition it took to clean up your pack for you. I’m half inclined to believe we could prosecute you for keeping such a lot of savage animals. You’d be wise to go mighty slow about trying to make trouble for any of us. We might take a notion to run you in.”

The man’s whole demeanor changed when he discovered that his bluster was not going to alarm the scouts.

“I hopes now,” he went on to say in a whining tone, “thet yuh won’t keep me from taking the pelts off my poor pets. They’s worth sumpin’ tuh me, likewise the scalps o’ the same. I been bankin’ on thet money this long time. Hit’s all I got tuh see me through the winter. Don’t be too hard on me, gents. I’m out o’ the wolf raisin’ line fo’ keeps, arter this bust-up.”

Ned consulted with his chums for a minute or two and then turned again to the intruder.

“Here’s what we propose to have you do, Harkness,” he remarked, with such an air of finality that the man knew he must yield to circumstances, “hand over that gun of yours to me; you’ll get it again in the morning, when we break camp. Then lie down and go to sleep. One of us will be on the watch all the time, so if you try any monkey-doodle business, as Jimmy here would call it, better go slow, or something will happen. Do you understand that, Harkness?”

The man’s ugly face grew as black as a thunder cloud, and then with an effort he tried to grin, though it only added to his unsavory appearance.

“Thar be times w’en a feller has tuh eat crow an’ I reckons as how this be sech a time fo’ me, younker,” he said, slowly. “Oh! I hain’t no ’jections tuh stayin’ hyar alongside the fire; but I hopes as how yuh’ll let me hev my pelts w’en mo’nin’ comes ’long.”

“Yes, we’ll agree to that and, if you behave, you can take your property after we clear out in the morning. Perhaps we’ll go so far as to invite you to breakfast, too, in the bargain, Harkness, to show that we have no bad feelings because your pack made us have a pretty hot session to-night. So that’s settled. Your gun, please.”

The wolf-herder handed it over, though with an ill grace. No doubt, he was what they call a “bad man” down in the Southwest, and this thing of being made a prisoner by a parcel of half-grown boys, as it seemed, galled him greatly.

After that he dropped down near the fire, clasped both arms about his knees and stared moodily into the flames.

“Jack, seems to me you’ve outstayed the time limit we set,” Ned suggested, after taking a quick look up to where the moon was sailing through a star-decked sky; for scouts early learn to tell time from the positions of heavenly bodies, and the setting of a star will be almost as sure an indication that a certain hour has arrived as though a watch had been consulted.

“Oh! well, I thought you seemed to be sleeping so sound that I’d let it run on a little,” the other made answer, for Jack was as generous as they make boys, “and then, you see, I got interested watching him come creeping along like a snake, stopping every minute to examine one of the dead wolves, and saying something to himself each time, like he kept getting madder and madder.”

“Well, I’m going on duty now, Jack, so just crawl over to your blanket and turn in,” said Ned, in his quiet but positive way.

Amos was hovering near him at the time, as though he wanted to say a few words on the sly. He found the chance when Ned sat down, also leaning against the same tree that had supported the other vidette.

“I wouldn’t think too much about hurtin’ the feelings of that old mule-skinner if I was you, Ned,” the kid cow-puncher went on to say, “he ain’t near so mad as he puts on. Why, if it hadn’t been for you and the rest, he’d never got a single pelt of all that pack. They were free and would a got clear away, if we hadn’t rounded the same up here. Fifteen hides, and as many scalps, he gets, without wasting his ammunition. He’s putting on – that’s what. But keep an eye out for him, Ned. That was a smart trick to take his gun away; but you’ve only scotched the snake, not killed it.”

Ned promised that he would watch the wolf-herder closely and not allow him to make any sort of suspicious move.

“I don’t think he means to try any funny business, though,” he added. “You see he stands to lose all his pelts if he pulls his freight and gives us the good-bye sign. And with five against him, the odds are too big; for a boy with a rifle can be just as dangerous as a full-grown man.”

It was somewhere near one o’clock at the time of the alarm. The moon was high up in the heavens and even starting down her road toward the western horizon.

Ned kept watch and ward diligently. He did not mean to be caught napping by any unsuspected circumstance. It was hardly likely that Harkness could have any allies near by. Ned had been particular in asking about that, and Amos assured him that so far as he knew, the wolf-herder conducted his business alone, shunning the society of others, save on rare occasions when he came to town for a spree.

The night passed away without anything else happening to disturb the sleep of Jimmy. Harry awoke later on and insisted on taking his turn at keeping watch; so Ned secured his blanket and lay down close to him, having impressed it on Harry’s mind that, at the least sign of a movement on the part of Harkness, he was to reach out a hand and shake him.

But just as Ned had said, the wolf man must have figured it out that he had everything to gain and nothing to lose by staying where he was and waiting for the boys to break camp, when his gun would be returned and himself left at liberty to rid those dead animals of their shaggy gray coats.

Jimmy was thoughtful to cook enough breakfast for an extra mouth, and so Harkness was given his full share of coffee, bacon, and fried potatoes, as well as all the crackers he could eat.

He said little or nothing, unless some question happened to be fired his way, when he would make a curt answer. All the while he kept his ears open and eyed the boys in a suspicious way, as though disturbed by their presence in the neighborhood. Those suits of khaki evidently puzzled Harkness, who could never have run across Boy Scouts before and knew nothing about their ways.

Noticing these looks on his part, and how he appeared to be listening intently, as though desirous of picking up certain information that might prove of value to him later on, Ned cautioned his chums against speaking of their affairs. This he managed to do, through certain gestures and nods, when the man’s eyes happened to be turned in another direction.

Later on they made ready to pull up stakes and once more start on their journey toward the cattle ranch, which they expected to reach before sunset on this same day.

Harkness was eagerly waiting to be handed his gun, which Ned had taken the trouble to unload while it was in his possession. There was not much chance that the man would dare fire upon them, since he knew what the result would be and how apt to prove unpleasant for a fellow of his size; but, then, Ned believed in taking all precautions possible, and he certainly did not like the looks of that heavy face with its rat-like eyes, which Jimmy compared with the glittering orbs of a pet ferret he had at home.

He had already been busily engaged removing the hides of the slain wolves and seemed to be willing to accept what the fates had given him. All the same, Ned believed he was a treacherous character who would betray his best friend for a money consideration, and he did not mean to trust him too far.

When everything had been packed and they were ready to depart, Ned laid the rusty gun of the wolf-herder on the ground.

“There’s your property, Harkness,” he remarked casually, “just as I promised. And I want to say in parting company with you, that I think you’re lucky to get about half your pelts, after losing the whole outfit. Of course, we don’t expect you to thank us for saving half a loaf; but we’ll be looking back as we leave here to see how you get on. And, Harkness, I wouldn’t be in any too big a hurry to step over to where I laid your gun. So-long!”

The man said never a word in reply but if looks could kill, surely Ned must have met his finish then and there, to judge from the black scowl that settled on the heavy face of the wolf man.

In this fashion, then, they started out on what they hoped would be their last day’s journey before arriving at the ranch of Harry’s uncle. All of the scouts seemed to be feeling particularly merry on this bright morning. Perhaps it was because of the clever way in which they had escaped from the many perils that had lain in wait to ambush them since leaving the Coast.

“We’re well out of gunshot distance by now,” observed Jack, “and he’s still working with his pelts, so it doesn’t seem as though we’d have any trouble with that Harkness. Of all the tough looking characters I’ve ever run across, he sure takes the cake. I don’t believe there could be anything worse made.”

At that Amos was heard to chuckle.

“Oh! you think so, do you, Jack?” he remarked with lofty scorn, “just wait till you glimpse my awful dad, and then you can talk. He’s a holy terror! Why, even the yellow curs in the town streets take to running with their tails between their hind legs when they see him coming along. His looks and his fog-horn voice have carried him through many a tight place; but there’s one hole he always sticks in. My dad is as good as a whole regiment, to make men shake in their boots; but – ” and again did the kid puncher pause in that strange way, while a mysterious smile crept over his dark face, as though certain recollections gave him more or less amusement.

Ned’s curiosity had been aroused to a mild extent, but he would not ask questions, preferring to wait for time to unravel the mystery connected with these vague hints on the part of Amos Adams.

A short time later and they had lost all track of the previous night’s camp in the hazy distance. And from that time forward, the scouts were interested only in what lay ahead; for somewhere far off they knew was to be found the cattle ranch to which they were bound and where a warm welcome, undoubtedly, awaited them, after their perilous hike across burning deserts, towering mountain ridges, and the valley with the evil name.

CHAPTER IX.

THE HOMING PIGEON

“What are we turning aside for, Ned?” and as Jimmy asked this question he laid a hand on the arm of the scout master, having pushed up from behind, leading the pack animal that had been given over to his charge after his own was lost.

“Why,” replied Ned, readily enough, “you see, Amos lives over among those trees, where there’s a little stream, and he hinted pretty broadly that, while we were passing, he’d like us to meet up with his mother.”

“Oh! that’s all right,” Jimmy asserted. “I’ve taken quite a liking for the kid and a little rest will do the bunch good, anyway. One thing I’ve made up my mind about, Ned, and I don’t care who hears me say it.”

“All right, pitch in, and let’s get the glad news, Jimmy,” remarked Jack, from a point near by.

“Never again for me to start our on a trip afoot while I’m here in this hot country!” Jimmy declared solemnly, holding up his hand, as though he were in the witness box. “What sillies we were not to have thought of that instead of putting our good cash into that bunco automobile that played out before it even got decently started.”

“It seems that we’ve all learned our little lesson,” Ned admitted, “and after this we ride, if we go at all. Cars may do very well, where there are half-way decent roads; but out on the sandy desert and on the plains give me a broncho every time.

“But say, are you fellows noticing how jolly this scenery is around here?” Harry wanted to know just then, from the rear. “Look at that sage brush on the slope of that low hill over to the right. It must be breast high to a horse, and seems like I could smell its fragrance away off here. How gray it looks, except where the wind waves it and then it seems nearly purple.”

“Yes,” added Ned, “and this must be what they call rattlesnake weed, though I don’t know what it’s got to do with the crawlers. You can see the grasshoppers jumping in that lush stuff where the ground’s moist. And there’s a king bird sitting on that high weed yonder.”

“Listen to the gophers whistling a warning to their kind, when they see us coming,” remarked Jack. “Yes, Harry, you’re right, this is worth looking at. Why, I wouldn’t be surprised now, if at night-time, you could hear the drowsy chirp of the crickets and the shrill rattle of katydids around here. A bigger contrast to what we went through in that desert you couldn’t imagine.”

“It’s sure all to the good,” asserted Jimmy, “and I don’t blame that mother of Amos for pitching her dugout in this particular region. But mebbe she’ll be sorry the boy didn’t fetch any game home with him.”

“Oh! Amos says he means to start out again in a different direction and knows where he’s pretty sure to get an antelope, anyhow,” Jack remarked.

They were now approaching the trees in which some sort of human habitation evidently had been constructed, for smoke was seen curling lazily upward.

It proved to be one of those half-dugout, half-building which is to be found in many parts of the Wild West where lumber is scarce. As there was practically no winter weather in this part of the country, it answered all purposes, though far from a thing of beauty.

Still, that mother of Amos’ had brightened things up more or less, so that it could be seen the hand of a woman was around. A small garden lay back of the house, surrounded by a wire fence to keep animals from devouring the precious green stuff which was grown there.

Several dogs started toward them with yelps and deep-throated barking; and Jimmy unconsciously reached out a hand for the Marlin that was fastened to the pack of his burro. Jimmy’s dislike for wolves was shared by dogs of all kinds. He said it must have been born in him, since he could not remember ever having had any desperate adventure with canine foes while a kid.

Amos, however, threw oil on the troubled waters and, at the sound of his voice, the fury of the dogs changed instantly to a noisy greeting. They jumped up and fawned on the kid in a way that told how much they loved him. And, doubtless, instinct told each beast that those in company of the young master must also be friends; for, when Ned whistled and snapped his fingers, one of the dogs immediately started to approach, wagging his tail in a neighborly way.

A small-sized woman had come out of the dugout and stood there with a hand shading her eyes, as though to see who might be approaching. Ned noticed that she carried a shotgun in her other hand, and it struck him that a woman who might often be left at home alone in this strange country had need of knowing how to use some sort of firearm.

She looked very meek and did not seem to have very much snap and go about her. When Amos introduced the boys and told what a great favor they had done him, she went around shaking hands in an odd way; but evidently Mrs. Adams differed from the vast majority of her sex, for she did not seem to have much to say.

“Gee! what a shame!” Jimmy muttered in Ned’s ear.

“What is?” asked the scout master, also in a whisper.

“That’s always the way it goes,” continued the observing Jimmy, “seems like there never was a shrinking little woman, as timid as they make ’em, but what she had to go and link herself with some big bully of a blustering man. Opposites seem to attract in this world; you’ve seen a speck of a girl pick out the tallest feller she could find, and the other way, too.”

“Yes, it does look like that, Jimmy,” admitted Ned, as he tried to discover some trace of spunk about the little woman, and utterly failed.

“Chances are,” Jimmy continued, in his reflective way, “that when this bad man of a Hy Adams, the worst case along the whole border, they say, gets on one of his tearin’ fits, he just makes Rome howl. And say, I can just see that poor timid little thing cowering down like a scared puppy when it hears its master raging. But, then, mebbe Amos he hangs around to sort of protect his maw; though it don’t seem as if a small chap like him could do much along that line.”

“If he does, he didn’t think it right to do any boasting that I can remember,” Ned replied, again studying the mistress of the dugout, but without much success.

Mrs. Adams insisted on their resting a short while and taking a cup of coffee with her. Apparently, she had some means of her own, for there seemed to be plenty to do with in the place; and when the boys saw the bunks used for sleeping they pronounced them not at all bad. Indeed Jimmy promptly began yawning; and, if any one had invited him to test one of the bunks, the chances are he would have only too willingly complied.

There was little said during the meal, at least by the mother of Amos. Perhaps, as Jimmy suggested in an aside to Ned, the weight of her troubles in being mated to a human hurricane like Hy Adams had taken all the life out of her, and hence she evinced but little interest in whatever happened.

Amos, as if to cover up this lack of conversational gifts on the part of his mother, kept the boys busy telling some of their past adventures. And, finally, Ned advised that they had better be getting ready to pull out, as considerable territory remained to be covered before they could expect to reach the cattle ranch buildings.

“You’ll sure look us up before long, Amos?” he said to the lad, as they shook hands at parting.

“I should say yes,” added impulsive Jimmy; “because I’d hate to think I wasn’t goin’ to see you again.”

Amos looked serious.

“I did promise you, didn’t I?” he observed slowly, “and when I says a thing I nigh always keep my word; but I kinder reckon as how I mightn’t be welcome over to the Double Cross Ranch.”

“You mean, because you have the hard luck to be connected with a bad man like Hy Adams?” Harry remarked. “But don’t bother about a little thing like that. My two uncles are the kind of men who judge a fellow by what he’s done himself, and not by his relations. Why, we had a bad egg in our family once, and seems to me he was hung or something of the kind. But that’s no reason I ought to be, is it?”

“Er, I don’t know about that,” muttered Jimmy, with a sparkle in his fun-loving blue eyes.

The good-byes were said, and the scouts started again toward the southeast. Amos had given them full directions, so that there was no possibility of their going wrong. And as the day was far cooler than many they had experienced of late, all of them were feeling in fine spirits.

They watched the buzzards lazily wheeling around high up in the heavens, apparently bent on finding out where they could get their next meal.

“What a fine view they must have of the plain up there,” Harry happened to remark; “makes me think of when we went up with those aviators, who had the dirigible balloon near the border of Death Valley and were experimenting in dropping bombs down, just like will be done in the next big war between the Nations, when battleships must give way to aeroplanes and submarines.”

“Watch that hawk, will you!” cried Jack, “see how he is chasing after that bird! I declare, it looks like he’d sure get his dinner.”

“How I hate hawks!” exclaimed Jimmy, hotly, as he reached for his gun, “they’re the pirates of the air, and just duck down on poor little birds whenever they feel like having a bite. Hey! he got the innocent that rush, didn’t he? Oh! wouldn’t I just like to get a shot at the murderer, though!”

Jimmy, of course, forgot this was the daily business of the hawk and that he only slew when he was hungry and not for pleasure. He also forgot that many men who call themselves sportsmen persist in killing game or game fish long after they have reached the limit of disposing of the same for food and even throw the victims of their cruelty aside in heaps – the more shame to their claim to manhood.