Transcriber’s Note
Italic text displayed as: _italic_
[Illustration: THE TWO STOOD WATCHING WITH WIDE EYES.
_Saddle Boys on the Plains_ _Page 21_
]
The Saddle Boys
on the Plains
Or
After a Treasure of Gold
BY
CAPTAIN JAMES CARSON
AUTHOR OF “THE SADDLE BOYS OF THE ROCKIES,” “THE SADDLE
BOYS IN THE GRAND CANYON,” “THE SADDLE BOYS
AT CIRCLE RANCH,” ETC.
ILLUSTRATED
NEW YORK
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
BOOKS FOR BOYS
BY CAPTAIN JAMES CARSON
THE SADDLE BOYS SERIES
12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.
THE SADDLE BOYS OF THE ROCKIES
Or, Lost On Thunder Mountain
THE SADDLE BOYS IN THE GRAND CANYON
Or, The Hermit of the Cave
THE SADDLE BOYS ON THE PLAINS
Or, After a Treasure of Gold
THE SADDLE BOYS AT CIRCLE RANCH
Or, In At The Grand Round-Up
CUPPLES & LEON CO., PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK.
Copyrighted 1913, by
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY
THE SADDLE BOYS ON THE PLAINS
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. STARTING FOR CHERRY BLOSSOM MINE 1
II. THE SUDDEN ALARM 11
III. A VISITOR FROM THE SKIES 21
IV. THE MYSTERY OF THE PACKET 29
V. IN SEARCH OF GAME 38
VI. SURPRISING FRANK 46
VII. CAUGHT IN HIS OWN TRAP 54
VIII. THE SILENCE AT CHERRY BLOSSOM 62
IX. A THREATENING STORM 72
X. STARTLING NEWS 81
XI. TRAILING THE TREASURE THIEVES 91
XII. THE PATH ALONG THE CLIFF 104
XIII. SIM HAS A CLOSE CALL 112
XIV. THE LONG CHASE 120
XV. THE PRAIRIE FIRE 127
XVI. A LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS 135
XVII. THE LONE SHACK 143
XVIII. “WHEN GREEK MEETS GREEK!” 153
XIX. THE SURRENDER 163
XX. AN ASTONISHING DISCOVERY 172
XXI. THE CONTENTS OF THE PACKET 181
XXII. HOW IT TURNED OUT—CONCLUSION 191
THE SADDLE BOYS ON THE PLAINS
CHAPTER I
STARTING FOR CHERRY BLOSSOM MINE
“So-long, boys! We’ll look for you back in ten days or two weeks,
Frank!”
“Sure, dad; but don’t worry if we fail to show up by then. Something
might happen to detain us at the mine, you know!”
“Send word, if you can, son. I suppose I ought to go with you myself;
but that game leg still troubles me on a long ride. Besides, you and
Bob have done so well lately, that I think it would be safe to trust
anything in your hands.”
“We’re going to do the best we can to get the tangle ironed out at
the mine, whatever it proves to be; and have matters running smooth
again. Good-by, Bart Heminway! All kinds of good luck with you on the
range while we’re away. So-long boys! Wish the whole bunch of you
could gallop with us! Ready, Bob? Then we’re off!”
A series of parting salutes, such as only wide-awake cowboys know how
to give, followed Frank and his chum as they galloped away from the
Circle Ranch cattle corral.
Frank’s father, the owner of the place, sat stride his big roan, and
surrounded by his dozen tried and true “punchers” watched his boy
Frank, accompanied by his comrade, Bob Archer, from Kentucky, as they
topped a slight rise of the prairie about half a mile away.
“One last shout, and then we lose sight of the old ranch house!” said
Frank.
They turned in the saddle, and waved their hats three times,
accompanying each movement with a clear call that brought an
answering whoop from the little cluster of horsemen.
Then the word was given, and the eager, mettlesome horses sprang
down the easy descent. The distant white-washed buildings, that
constituted the heart of the famous Circle Ranch in Arizona,
disappeared from sight. Before the two boys lay the great level
plains, with the mountains in the distance.
Frank had been brought up amid such surroundings, and was fairly
well versed in such things as went with life on a big cattle ranch.
He was never so happy as when mounted on his sturdy and swift pony,
“Buckskin,” and galloping over the country, either pursuing some of
the duties of a cow puncher, or hunting such game as might be found
within a radius of twenty miles.
Frank was a athletic fellow, as might be expected of one who spent so
much time on horseback. His clear blue eyes gleamed fearlessly, and
he had proved this trait of his character on numerous occasions.
Bob Archer, his chum, had until recently lived in Kentucky, where he
attended a military academy at Frankfort. His father having entered
into partnership with Colonel Haywood in several mining ventures, the
old home had been left behind for a new life in Arizona.
These two lads had early taken a great fancy to one another. Of
course when Bob first came to the cattle country he was a real
“tenderfoot;” but experience was fast taking that title away. Indeed,
the boys of Circle Ranch declared that it was seldom a “greenhorn”
picked up so quickly a knowledge of the thousand-and-one things
essential to the genuine cowboy.
He had brought a black horse from his Kentucky home; and this same
Domino had often proved that he could run a mile faster than the
smaller Buckskin; but when it came to an all-day gallop, the animal
Frank bestrode was apt to show up better as a “stayer.”
Not a great while before this, the boys had passed through a series
of stirring adventures while investigating a mystery that had awed
the Indians for perhaps fully a century. A mountain within a day’s
ride of the ranch often gave vent to strange sounds that were likened
to the growl of heavy thunder. What it turned out to be, and how
the boys solved the puzzle, is contained in the first volume of this
series, called “The Saddle Boys in the Rockies; or, Lost On Thunder
Mountain.”
It was shortly after their return to the ranch that a remarkable
thing happened when a message that had been found in a sealed bottle
floating in the current of the Lower Colorado River was brought to
Colonel Haywood, at a time when he happened to be laid up with a
broken leg.
If you think you would like to learn how Frank and Bob took the place
of the ranchman, going on horseback to the world-famous Grand Canyon
of the Colorado in answer to the call that had reached them, together
with what remarkable things happened to them while there, read the
second volume in this series, entitled, “The Saddle Boys in the Grand
Canyon; or, The Hermit of Echo Cave.”
And now the lads were once again starting out on a long gallop that
would take them far to the south, into the mining country within a
day’s ride of the Mexican border. Here was located the most valuable
of all the gold-producing properties controlled by Colonel Haywood
and Mr. Archer, known as the Cherry Blossom Mine.
Word had been brought to the colonel that there seemed to be trouble
brewing at the mine. The message had given no particulars, nor was
it signed with any name. It simply stated that if he were wise, and
wished to nip trouble in the bud, he would better take a horse and
run down to investigate, before matters reached a crisis.
But as Mr. Archer was East, looking after the marketing of certain
stock in Wall Street, and Colonel Haywood’s broken leg had hardly
healed enough for him to attempt a ride of several days, the ranchman
found himself once more compelled to throw the burden on the
shoulders of his only son Frank, and the latter’s chum, Bob Archer.
Armed with all manner of instructions, and legal documents to prove
their authority as the representatives of the parties holding a
controlling interest in the wonderfully productive Cherry Blossom,
the two chums were now heading into the hazy South. What lay beyond
no one could even guess; but both seemed to “feel in their bones,” as
Bob expressed it, that new and surprising adventures were in store
for them among the plains and mountains of Southern Arizona.
And so they started out that fine morning, with high anticipations.
In the bracing air the two horses vied with each other in covering
the ground; though Frank constantly advised his comrade to hold
Domino in.
“Out here, you see, Bob,” he would remark, “Where the horses are
used to making a ten-hour run; and then going at it again after a
little rest, when a stampede happens along, we learn the value of
holding a willing pony in early in the day. It means better work
later in the run. He gradually gets down to business; just as you’ve
seen engines do in making a slow start.”
“Sure, I understand all that, Frank, because you’ve told me lots of
times; but then Domino doesn’t seem to get on to it,” Bob replied,
with a laugh. “He pulls as if he belonged to a fire engine, and had
heard the alarm. Hold up there, you Blue-Grass exile; before the day
is done you’ll have all the exercise you want, I reckon.”
“There’s a fine bunch of our cattle grazing down by the stream
yonder,” remarked Frank, pointing with the quirt which was fastened
to his left wrist, cowboy fashion.
“And this is about as far as they’re allowed to roam, isn’t it?”
asked Bob.
“Yes, some of the boys have been keeping watch on this lot all
night,” Frank replied. “See, there’s a fellow now, waving his hat,
and whooping at us. That must be Chesty Lane. Say, you can just
depend on it he’s feeling some bad that he can’t ride with us. Chesty
is always hungry for something to happen. When things run too smooth
he just has to get away, and look for excitement somehow.”
“It was down through that rocky coulie that last pack of wolves
crept, when they played such hob with the calves, wasn’t it?” Bob
inquired, after they had answered the wild cheers of the “puncher”
who was serving as guardian to the herd.
“Yep!” said Frank. “But the chase was swift, and not a single one
of the pack ever got away. I knocked over a hairy thief myself, and
that’s the skin on the floor of my room. It’s nearly as big as the
pelt you got, when we tracked old Sallie and her whelps to their den,
and you shot her.”
“Wolves are getting scarce around here, Frank, what with the ranchmen
offering bounties for every scalp, besides what the state pays!”
“Oh! there are always a few coming down from the mountains,” replied
the other. “Up there they have breeding places where no man can ever
find ’em. But we have no cause to complain about wolves nowadays.
It’s the rustlers that bother us most.”
“That crowd under the Mexican, Pedro Mendoza, you mean,” Bob went on.
“Yes, they have some secret hiding place that as yet has never been
discovered. Some believe they come all the way up from Mexico, but my
dad never would take to that idea. And he declares that the next time
any of the Circle cattle are driven off, he’s going to camp on the
trail of the thieves, and keep on following them if it takes him down
to Chihuahua.”
Frank himself looked quite grim as he said this. Evidently he was of
the same mind as his father, the rancher.
When two hours had passed, and they had placed a good many miles
between themselves and the ranch house that lay far to the north,
Frank drew up his horse.
“Better let ’em take a breathing spell,” he remarked. “And you
notice, now, that your black doesn’t seem quite so eager to rush
things.”
“I knew he would get over it,” laughed Bob, as he patted the shiny
flank of his mount. “But what lies away yonder toward the Southwest?”
“That’s the Arrowhead Ranch buildings, with a grove of timber about
them,” Frank replied. “You know they’ve got a fine stream of water
there, that comes down from the mountains. Father tried to buy that
ranch, but some one else had the option. I’m afraid it’s going to
drop into the hands of the Syndicate that is gobbling up all the good
properties around here.”
“You mean the crowd of Eastern capitalists, headed by the father of
Peg Grant, the fellow we had the trouble with on Thunder Mountain?”
Bob went on.
“Yes, the same bunch,” Frank continued. “They have it in for dad,
I’m afraid, just because he chooses to run his own business in his
own way, and refuses to throw in with the Syndicate.”
“You won’t go over to the Arrowhead, then?” Bob asked.
“Not to-day. I’ve been there lots of time, though. One of our boys
got in a peck of trouble with some of their punchers a short time
ago; and just now there’s bad blood between us. Come on, and we’ll
hit out for the hills some miles off.”
Frank gave Buckskin the signal with his heels, and away the two
horses flew over the level.
On reaching the hilly country Frank struck into a trail leading
through a district that was rapidly growing wilder as they advanced;
though after a while they might again strike out on the open country.
There were times when the trail itself was so narrow that Bob fell in
behind, and they moved along in single file, the horses climbing the
rise gallantly.
Frank had his eyes ahead. He fancied that he had detected some slight
movement at a turn about fifty yards beyond the spot they had now
reached.
“Hold up a minute, Bob!” he exclaimed, holding out his hand in the
manner understood by every rider of the plains.
Just as he spoke he heard a strange “swishing” sound close
by. Involuntarily Frank ducked his head. Brought up amid such
surroundings, his ear was in tune with all things connected with
range life; and in this hissing sound he knew that he had caught the
whirl of a lariat through the air. Just as he turned in his saddle,
he heard from his chum a half-muffled cry that thrilled him.