CHAPTER XXII_The Boy Ranchers on the Trail; Or, The Diamond X After Cattle Rustlers

BUD'S DISCOVERY

Once it became evident that catching the rustlers was likely to

be the work of a long chase on the trail, the whole party of

pursuers came to a halt beside the boy ranchers. And after some

rapid talk of what might lay beyond their stopping place, in a

lonely, wild and desolate section of the defile, the conversation

switched to what had surprised Bud and his cousins--the absence

of the cattle.

"I s'posed they were driving the steers ahead of 'em all along,"

admitted North "They drove the animals off our ranch, and I

didn't think but what they were hazing 'em along to some place

where they could change or blur the brands, and then sell 'em."

"That's what I thought, too," acknowledged Dick.

"Well, I must say I didn't think much about it," confessed Bud.

"When I saw Del Pinzo and his gang in there all I wanted to do

was to come to hand-grips with 'em. I forgot all about the

cattle. But after we'd chased along a bit I did begin to wonder

where my animals were--_our_ animals, I should say," he

corrected himself with a glance at his cousins. However, they

understood.

"They must have gotten the cattle over to Double Z, or wherever

it is they dispose of 'em," suggested Dick.

"They couldn't--not in this short time," declared Slim. "We

followed 'em too close. Besides, there isn't a sign of any cattle

having been here, nor in that place where we surprised th' head

Greaser and his gang. Not a sign of cattle!"

He looked up and down the gorge, as did the other cowboys. But

not even the sharpest eye could detect the faintest "sign" of the

steers having been driven along the passage.

"They must have them hidden somewhere," said Dick. "We'd better

go back to the place where the sign petered out. There must be

some opening there out of the main canyon."

"If there is it's so well hid that it takes sharper eyes than

I've got to find it," declared Snake, and he was noted for his

far-seeing and clear vision.

"Go _back_!" exclaimed North impulsively. "We aren't going

back, are we, until we get Del Pinzo and his gang?"

"Shoot 'em up--that's what I advise!" cried Yellin' Kid. There

was a moment's pause, and Bud spoke.

"We're got two things to do," said the boy rancher. "One is to

get our cattle back, and the other is to nab the rustlers. But

it's more important to get the cattle, I think.

"If we don't do that our ranch experiment will be a failure," he

went on. "But, of course, for the sake of other ranchers, it

would be a mighty good thing if we could put Del Pinzo and his

rustler crowd out of business."

"Can't we do both?" asked Nort.

"That's what I was coming to," his cousin continued. "If we can

get on the trail of the hidden steers--for hidden they are, I'm

sure--we can haze them back to the valley. Then we can keep on

after this crowd," and he nodded toward the winding trail that

led down the narrow defile.

"Then you think we'd better go back!" asked Dick.

"Let's see what Slim says" answered Bud. Naturally he would turn

to his father's foreman for advice.

"Oh, you're leavin' it t' me, are you?" asked Slim, as he

finished rolling his cigarette, a feat he could accomplish with

one hand. Then he lighted it, took a satisfying puff and went on:

"If you ask my advice I'd say to go back an' see if you can't

locate the cattle. As Bud remarks, they're dollars an' cents. Th'

rustlers aren't, though it would be a mighty good stunt t' wipe

'em off th' face of this cow country. But maybe we can attend to

_them_ later."

"Turn back she is!" exclaimed Bud, accepting, as did the others,

the advice of Slim as being final. "We'll see if we can find the

cattle, and then haze them to a safe place. After that we'll nab

Del Pinzo and his bunch--if we can," he added, as a saving

clause.

"Suits me!" remarked Yellin' Kid, taking off his hat and looking

at the two bullet holes. "That nabbin' part is what I want t'

play at," and his grin suggested that when he and the Greaser met

there would be some interesting happenings.

It having been thus decided that the pursuit would be abandoned

for the time being, a sort of council of war was held to settle

on the next course.

"I say grub!" exclaimed Bud, knowing that the suggestion would

come with better grace from him than from some of the men who

were working for him and his father. "Let's eat!"

There was no debate on this question and when the ponies had

been turned loose to graze on what scanty grass they could find,

a fire was made and preparations started for feeding the hungry

posse. For they were that--both hungry and a posse, bent on the

capture of the lawless rustlers. Though, for the time, righteous

revenge was given over to the more practical side of the

question--getting back the cattle.

Probably you do not need to be told that little time was wasted

over the meal, simple as it was. Cowboys, on the trail, or

otherwise engaged in their work of the ranch or range, do not

spend much time over the pleasures of the appetite. There is a

time for feasting, and a time for chasing cattle rustlers, and

there was no sense in combining the two. That, evidently, was the

thought in the minds of Bud and his friends, for they hurried

through their eating, and, having rested the horses, were soon in

saddles again.

"Now," remarked Bud, talking the matter over with Slim, "what is

the best plan?"

"To get back, as fast as we can, t' th' place where we saw th'

last signs of th' cattle," was the foreman's answer. "The

unravelin' of th' skein of mystery, t' use a poetical expression,

Bud, is there!"

They all agreed with this view of it, and after a short ride down

the defile, to see, if by chance, any of the Del Pinzo crowd

might be in evidence, or returning, the back trail was taken.

"We aren't going to discover much this day," observed Bud, as he

rode slowly along between Nort and Dick.

"Why, did you see a black rabbit?" Nort asked, remembering what

had happened when a similar incident occurred, just before the

strange events narrated in the chapter preceding this.

"No, I didn't see a black jack," Bud answered. "But it won't be

long until dark, for we don't get the full benefit of the

afternoon sun down in this gorge. And we can't do anything except

by daylight. No use looking for sign in the dark."

"That's right," agreed Nort. "But I was afraid it was a black

rabbit you'd seen."

"As if we didn't have enough bad luck without that," commented

Dick. "It's as bad, losing your herd as it is not to have enough

water to give 'em what they need," and he referred to the time

when, by the efforts of this same Del Pinzo, the supply for the

reservoir of Happy Valley was cut off.

"Oh, well, it might be worse," observed Bud, with a sort of

cheerful, philosophical air, for he was of rather a happy

disposition.

"How?" asked Snake, for he was rather "sore" because Del Pinzo

and the rustlers had escaped. Perhaps Snake felt that he might

have gone in and captured the outlaws single-handed when he was

on the lone spying expedition.

"Well, I might never have had any cattle for those fellows to

steal," went on Bud. "But say, boys," he went on, as they came to

a place where the trail seemed to divide. "Let's take this other

road back. It looks a bit easier, and we want to favor the ponies

all we can."

"Go ahead," advised Slim, to whom Bud looked for confirmation of

his plan. "Anything that makes it easier for th' horses makes it

more sure for us. And we may have a long hunt ahead of us."

The care taken by the boy ranchers and their friends of their

animals was not exaggerated, nor unusual. In the West so much

depends on a man's horse--his comfort and very life, often--that

it is a foolish fellow, indeed, who will not bestow at least some

thought and care on his horse. The animal becomes a trusted

companion and friend to the cowboys and prospectors.

So, in order, as he hoped, to provide an easier means of getting

back to the place they wished to reach, Bud led the way along a

different trail on the retreat.

It was practically a retreat, though one they had selected for

themselves, since the outlaws had distanced them.

It was rather a dejected bunch of boy ranchers and their friends

that were now back-trailing. There was not much talk, after the

excitement of the attack which had "petered out," and even Bud,

gay and cheerful as he usually was, now seemed to have little to

say.

It was Dick who startled them all by suddenly exclaiming:

"Look ahead there! Isn't that a man on the trail?" He, with Nort

and Bud were in advance of the others. Dick pointed toward the

place where he thought he saw something suspicious.

"I don't glimpse anything," observed Nort.

"Nor I," said his cousin.

"He's gone now," Dick stated. "But I did see some one, and I'm

almost sure it was a Greaser. Looked just like one of their

hats."

"What is it!" called Slim, for he caught snatches of the rather

excited talk of the boys.

"Dick thought he saw one of the Del Pinzo gang," answered Bud.

"Maybe he's the fellow I cracked on the head," suggested Snake.

For they had lost sight of that individual in the mad rush into

the canyon, and had not seen him when they turned back.

"Say, wouldn't it be a good thing to capture him?" asked Bud

eagerly. "We could make him tell where the others are, and where

our cattle are hidden."

"If we can get him," conceded Slim.

"There he is again!" cried Dick. "Come on, fellows!"

Disregarding, or forgetting the travel-weary horses, the ranch

lad urged his own steed ahead at as rapid a pace as the animal

could be induced to develop in a spurt.

"Take it easy!" advised Nort to his brother, but he might as well

have called to the wind, for Dick was off and away.

"I don't see anything!" cried Bud, and though he had looked

eagerly forward at Dick's call he had glimpsed neither hat nor

face of any personage who might be suspected of being one of the

Del Pinzo gang.

But, even with that, Bud was not going to miss a chance to be in

at the finish of whatever was about to happen, so he spurred his

animal forward.

"Come on, boys!" cried Slim to his comrades. "We can't let those

youngsters tackle this game alone--'specially when if there's one

of the rustlers there may be more. _Pronto_!"

He galloped forward, as did the others, along the new trail that

Bud had suggested taking. But Dick was in the lead, and, in a few

seconds, was out of sight beyond an outcropping ledge of rock,

which narrowed the trail at this particular point.

"Watch your step there, boys!" cried Snake, as he saw What was

likely to prove a bad turning. "I don't see how Dick got around

it as he did, taking it at the gallop," he went on.

And, as it happened, Dick had not exactly made it, for when Bud

and Nort reached the dangerous turn, slightly after Dick had

disappeared abound it, they saw no sight of their companion.

"Pull up!" cried Bud sharply. "There's something wrong!" Nort was

beginning to think so himself, and he hauled his steed back with

such good will and energy that the animal was almost on its

haunches.

"Where in the world did he go?" cried Bud.

Nort asked the same question, for there lay the narrow trail

before them, running along a ledge, with a shelving bank of shale

and sand on one side and a towering face of rock on the other.

Snake Purdee raced at such speed around the turn, in spite of his

own admonition to the boy ranchers, that the cowboy nearly ran

down Bud and Nort.

"Where's Dick?" cried Snake, at once aware that the stout lad was

not in sight.

"He's vamoosed--somewhere," said Bud. "Maybe he met-up with that

Greaser and----"

At that moment, however, there came a cry, unmistakably of

distress, seemingly from some distance ahead and down below the

high and narrow trail on which the party had come to a halt.

"There's Dick now!" cried Nort, recognizing his brother's voice.

"Where in the world is he?" asked Bud, looking about.

In answer Snake pointed down the sloping bank of shale and sand,

and there, at the bottom, was Dick, half buried in the soft

material, and his horse, with twisted saddle, was standing near

by, looking rather the worse for wear. And if the countenance of

the animal had been visible it would doubtless have shown pained

surprise.

"What's' the matter? What you doing down there?" called Nort to

his brother, as Dick proceeded to extricate himself from the sand

and shale that covered him almost to his neck.

"You don't s'pose I'm down here for fun, do you?" floated up the

somewhat sarcastic answer. "I came around that turn too fast and

the horse just sat down at the edge and slid here. It's lucky I'm

not killed!"

"It sure is!" agreed Slim. "You want to take a strange trail

easy, boy. Are you hurt--or your horse?"

Dick was about two hundred feet below them at the foot of the

slope. He got up and limped over to his animal.

"Guess he's all right," was the reply.

"How about you?" asked Bud, for Dick had followed the real

westerner's habit of looking first to his steed.

"Oh, I'm scratched up a bit, and lame," was the rueful reply,

"but I guess nothing is busted unless it's one of my girths."

The others watched him, while he straightened his saddle, which

had slipped around under the horse. Then Dick called up:

"It's all right. I can ride him, I reckon," which he proved by

vaulting into the saddle.

"How am I going to get back up there, though?" he asked. "It's as

slippery as an iceberg."

"You can't get up," Snake called down. "Don't try it. The trail up

here goes along the same direction as the one down there. Keep on

it until we join you."

Which Dick did, his pony, fortunately, proving to have suffered

no injuries in the unexpected slide down the hill. And thus, by a

narrow margin, was an accident diverted. For had the slope down

which Dick plunged, because of taking the turn too suddenly, been

of rock, both he and the horse might have been badly hurt, if not

killed.

"Keep a lookout for that Greaser," called Dick up to his chums

above him.

"I don't believe you saw any," retorted Slim. "There aren't any

signs of him here."

Nor were there, though the cowboys made careful scrutiny. And

afterward Dick admitted that he might have mistaken the

fluttering of a bush for the hat of someone he thought a member

of Del Pinzo's gang. In a short time the upper path merged into

the trail below, and Dick rejoined his friends, exhibiting some

scratches sustained in his perilous slide.

Together the posse rode on, making a trail back to the main

defile, and out of the one down which the Greaser and his gang

had turned, where they had been discovered by Dick. And then

Bud's prediction came true. The sun, which never shone directly

into the main canyon for any great length of time, began to set,

bringing gloom into the defile long before it would make its

appearance on the level country up above.

Seeing the gathering darkness, Slim advised calling a halt, and

this was done several miles beyond the place where the last trace

of the stolen cattle had been observed.

"Shall we camp here!" asked Bud, deferring to the foreman, as was

natural under the circumstances.

"We've got grass and water," Slim remarked, indicating a spring

toward which, even then, some of the horses were hastening.

"Water for the ponies and us, grass for the animals, and there

ought to be some grub left."

"There is," said Snake Purdee, who had assumed, or been given (it

did not much matter which) the office of commissary. "We brought

along plenty."

"And we may need it before we reach the end of the trail,"

remarked Bud. "I don't believe it's going to be easy to find

where those cattle disappeared to."

"There's only two ways, or at th' most three, in which they could

be kept away from us," said Slim, as he slid from his saddle.

"What are they?" asked Dick, who, like his brother, was always

eager to learn from a true son of the West, such as was the

foreman of Diamond X.

"Well," Slim resumed, "they've either been driven down some side

passage, or gorge, such like as we found Del Pinzo in, or they

were back-tracked to th' open an' driven off there th' same night

they was run off."

"That might be," admitted Bud. "I didn't think of a back track."

"Well, I did," Slim said, "but the signs of it was so faint I

passed it up."

A back trail, I might explain, is where an animal, or several of

them, or even a human, for that matter, turns and retraces the

way first traveled. A fox, fleeing before the hounds, will often

do this, and as the scent does not indicate the direction in

which Reynard is running, the dogs are often deceived.

But in the case of the fox the imprints of the animal's paws are

so light that perhaps only with a microscope could it be told

when he had "back-tracked." Except, of course, in some place

where soft mud might retain the impression of both trails.

In the case of a large body of cattle, also, though the scent

would not be relied upon, it would be difficult for the casual,

or, in some cases, even the trained observer, to say where the

herd had been turned and driven back over the same course

originally taken.

Thus pursuers would be baffled. And when to this is added the

fact that the floor of the gorge was of rock, in the main, which

did not take, or retain, any impressions, the puzzle was all the

more difficult to solve.

"Well, we'll see what happens in the morning," observed Bud, as

preparations for the camp went on.

The usual watches were set that night, two of the posse being

constantly on guard. It was rather nervous work for the boy

ranchers, especially Nort and Dick, as they started at every

chance sound which seemed to echo so loudly in the darkness. And

once Dick, who was taking the tour of duty with Yellin' Kid,

suddenly fired at an object he saw moving.

It was only a luckless coyote, as was evidenced by the howl of

pain that followed the report of Dick's gun, and then the night

was made hideous and sleepless, for the time, by the chorus of

weird howls from the other slinking beasts who were hanging

about, hoping for something to eat.

However, it was nearly morning when Dick did his shooting, and a

little later they all turned out for an early breakfast, the odor

of the coffee and sizzling bacon producing an aroma finer than

that of the most costly French perfume.

"And now for the day's work!" exclaimed Bud, when they were once