A CALL FOR HELP
Without waiting for his pony to come to a stop, Bud fairly flung
himself out of the saddle, and with his rope, or lariat, coiled on his
arm he ran toward the corral.
"What's matter?" demanded Babe Milton, the assistant foreman, pausing
in his repeated exclamations of:
"Some ridin'! Some ridin'!"
"Don't you fellows know any better than to let a tenderfoot ride
Tartar?" cried Bud. "That horse is next door to an outlaw, and you
wouldn't get on him yourself, Babe!"
"You said an earful!" came the quick response. "I wouldn't!"
"Then how'd you come to let this fellow on? Who is he, anyhow?" cried
Bud, as he slipped through a hunch of cowboys who opened to let him
pass.
"Fresh tenderfoot," some one said.
"He would ride!" added another.
"Says he's your cousin," added a third ranch hand.
"My _cousin_!" cried Bud. Then he did not stop to do any more talking.
He leaped the fence of the corral, and, as he did so he became aware of
another stranger--a tenderfoot like the lad on Tartar--standing within
the fenced-off place. This lad, who bore all the marks of a
newly-arrived Easterner, was rather short and stout--not to say fat.
He stood beside an ancient and venerable cow pony, which was never
ridden when there was anything else in the corral to throw a saddle on.
And this lad was gazing with fear-widened eyes at the figure of the
other lad.
"Get off, Nort! Get off!" cried this stout lad.
"Don't tell him to do that!" ordered Bud sharply. "He'll break his
neck sure! Stick, and I'll rope Tartar!" he shouted, trying to make
his voice heard above the thunder of the feet of the half-maddened
horse, and the now somewhat subdued shouts of the cowboys.
Bud Merkel knew his business. He had not lived all his sixteen years
on his father's ranch not to learn how to throw a skillful rope, and he
now took his position just within the corral, and at a place where he
could intercept the dashing outlaw, Tartar, as the animal came around
again with the flapping lad clinging to his back.
"Can you manage, Bud?" called Slim, from his cross seat in his saddle,
where he was looking on.
"I'll get him!" was the grim answer.
Many thoughts were shooting through the mind of Bud Merkel, not the
least of which was the remark of Babe Milton to the effect that the lad
on Tartar was Bud's cousin.
"Then the other must be, too," thought Bud as he swung his rope and
directed a quick glance at the fat lad now hugging the inner rails of
the corral fence. "But how'd they get here, and what made him try that
outlaw?"
However, this was no time to spend in asking oneself questions. There
was need of action, and it came a moment later.
Hissing and swishing through the air, the coils of Bud's lariat fell
around the neck of the plunging, rearing, running Tartar. In another
instant Bud had taken a turn or two around a post, and, by carefully
applying a snubbing pressure, the pony was brought to a stop.
"Get down--quick!" ordered Bud when the horse was quiet enough to
permit of this. And as the other lad obeyed, and shook himself
together, limping over toward Bud the latter asked: "Are you hurt?"
"Not a bit," was the laughing answer. "I could 'a' stuck on. He
couldn't throw me."
"Don't you fool yourself!" exclaimed Bud, while some of the cowboys
went into the corral and loosened his lariat from the neck of the now
subdued animal. Tartar, once the offending stranger was no longer on
his back, seemed normal. "Don't you fool yourself! You couldn't have
stayed on a second longer."
"Betcher I could!" came the quick response. "If you'll rope him
again----"
"Cut it out, Nort!" came from the fat lad, who looked enough like the
daring rider to be his brother, as, indeed, he was.
"Oh, let me alone, Dick!" snapped the other. "I can ride!"
"Some ridin'! Oh, boy, some ridin'!" murmured the fat assistant
foreman of Diamond X, while his companions grinned.
"You may know how to ride an ordinary horse," admitted Bud with a
smile, as he coiled the rope which one of the men handed to him. "But
Tartar isn't a regular pony. He's an outlaw, and even Del Pinzo won't
take a chance on him. I don't see how they come to let you," he added,
gazing somewhat reproachfully at the assembled cowboys.
They had begun to slink away, for they recognized the pseudo-authority
held by the son of the ranch owner. Still they could justify their
action, somewhat.
"He _wanted_ to ride," declared Babe Milton. "Would have it so, and we
roped Tartar for him. I told him your pa wouldn't like it if he was
here, but----"
"I reckon you thought you'd see some fun," said Bud, half smiling, for
though he realized that the strange lad had been in some danger, he
also realized that the cowboys, fond as they were of fun and practical
jokes, would not have allowed the matter to go too far.
"It's up to me!" declared the slim lad, trying to brush some of the
dust and horse hair from his clothes. "'Tisn't their fault at all."
"Good kid," murmured some of the cowboys, glad to be thus vindicated.
"I told him to keep off," said the fat lad, following Bud and the
daring rider from the corral. "I told him to pick a quiet horse, but
he said he wanted a bucker."
"He shore got it," chuckled Slim Degnan, as he ambled along. "He shore
did!"
"Well, I'm glad you're not hurt," exclaimed Bud. "I guess you're my
cousins; aren't you?" he asked, holding out his brown, muscular hand to
grasp the rather thinner and whiter palm of the lad who had been on
Tartar.
"Yes, I'm Nort," was the response. "This is Dick, my brother. We're
going to stay all summer--if you'll keep us," he added, with a
whimsical smile. "And after this I'll let you pick my horses for me."
"It'll be safer, until you learn to ride," said Bud. "I mean learn to
ride western cow ponies," he added quickly, for he did not want to
assume this other lad could not ride.
"I guess I don't know so much as I thought I did," confessed Nort.
"Though I did ride a lot at the Academy."
"Well, come on to the house," invited Bud. "Dad's away, but mother's
there. Have you met her?"
"No," answered Nort. "We just got here. You see we came ahead of
time. Happened to meet one of your wagons over at the depot, and rode
out here in it. I sort of lost my head when I struck the ranch and
wanted a ride right off the bat. I had it, too!" he added with a smile.
"Dad said something about you moseying out this way before snow flew,"
spoke Bud, as he walked with his cousins toward the main ranch house,
which stood in the midst of a number of low red buildings, itself of
the same structure and color. "But I didn't expect you so soon, or I'd
'a' been over to the station."
"It was all right--we didn't want any fussing," said Nort. "And, as I
say, we started sooner than we expected. Didn't even write."
"No, I guess you didn't," admitted Bud. "Dad sort of mentioned, casual
like, that you'd be along sooner or later, but he didn't get any word
from you recently."
"Well, we're here, anyhow," spoke Dick, the fat youth, with a sigh of
evident relief, as he looked back toward the corral.
"I just got in myself," said Bud. "Been away two days mending fence.
Had to sleep out one night, and we weren't exactly prepared for it.
But I'm mighty glad you've come! We can have some corking times. I'll
get you ponies that'll be--er--better to ride than Tartar," he said,
substituting the word "better" for that of "safer" which, at first, he
had intended to use.
"That's good!" exclaimed Dick. "I don't claim to be any rider, though
I can stick to the saddle once I land there," and he shot a side glance
at his more impulsive brother.
"Oh, I could 'a' stuck if there'd been a _saddle_," declared Nort.
"That was the trouble. I'll ride Tartar yet!" he cried.
"Better go slow," advised Bud. "But there's mother in the door now,
and I can smell grub. She'll be surprised to see you."
"Who's that girl?" asked Dick, as he noticed one standing beside the
stout, motherly-looking woman in the doorway of the ranch house.
"That's my sister Nell," remarked Bud.
"Nell! Say, she has grown!" cried Nort. "I didn't know she was that
big!"
"Oh, this is a good country for growing up in!" laughed Bud. "Here's
Nort and Dick, Mother!" he called.
"Well, land sakes! I never expected to see _you_ two!" cried Mrs.
Merkel, hastily wiping off her mouth with the corner of her apron,
preparatory to kissing her nephews. "Land! But you've grown!"
"Not any more than Nell!" declared Dick, as he kissed his aunt and girl
cousin, an example gladly followed by Nort. For once the fat lad had
beaten his slim brother to it.
"Why didn't you write? We didn't know you were coming for a month yet!
Where's your trunks? How'd you get here? Come in and wash up and
we'll have supper!"
All this Mrs. Merkel showered on the two "tenderfeet" in a breath, at
the same time fairly "shooing" them into the house as a motherly hen
might direct her chickens toward the feeding coop.
"Oh, we just pulled up stakes and lit out," laughed Nort. "We got
tired of the East. Oh, but it's great here!" he exclaimed, as he
looked back before entering the house, and saw, through the clear air,
the wonderful blue sky, and, in the distance, a range of mountains.
"It's just what I dreamed it would be," he softly murmured.
"Glad you like it! We'll have some swell times!" voiced Bud. "But you
want to get those duds off," he added, as he glanced at his cousin's
clothes.
"We sure do!" declared Nick. "We've got outfits in our trunks.
They're in the wagon. Maybe they aren't just the proper clothes for a
ranch, but they're old things----"
"The older the better!" interrupted Bud, and he was about to follow his
cousins inside when Nell exclaimed:
"Some one is coming! Look!"
They all turned to observe a solitary horseman riding at top speed for
the group of ranch buildings. He came from the direction where Bud and
the foreman had seen the slim wisp of smoke about an hour before, and
as he rode, the man shouted above the thundering thuds of his horse's
hoofs:
"Help! Help! Can't you send help!"