THE WHISTLE OF PASSING BULLETS.
"They seem to be gaining on us!" said Merritt uneasily. "Hadn't we
better romp ahead a little faster, boys?"
"Sure! Hit up the pace all you want!" It was neither Rob nor Andy who
made this game reply, but Tubby! This response drew Rob's heart closer
to the fat chum than ever before. A fellow who could show such nerve
would have the best chance in the world to become a first-class scout,
when once he woke up and began to study as he should.
They proceeded to coax their horses to pick up some, and for a time the
gallant animals did manage more than to hold their own with the
pursuers; but when half an hour had passed even Tubby could see that the
distance separating them from that hustling lot of hard riders did not
appear to be quite as great as after the spurt.
"Say, do we fight for it if we are cornered?" Andy wanted to know. When
the patrol leader turned to glance back at him, he saw that while the
boy's face might be somewhat pale, there was a dogged look around the
eyes that spoke volumes.
"Well, they say that Boy Scouts never should fight unless driven into a
corner, where they have to defend themselves to save their own lives, or
the lives of others," Rob shouted back.
"That settles it, then," Andy replied. And Rob could see that
considerable of his anxiety must have been connected with his doubt as
to whether it should be their duty as lovers of peace to give up and
surrender without striking a blow, or resist; for he even seemed tickled
with what Rob had told him.
No one asked Tubby what he thought about matters. It was enough for them
to know that the fat and clumsy chum was there in his saddle still, and
managing by some means to keep close behind them. His horse must have
suffered exceedingly, bearing all that heavy load; and it was lucky Rob
had been wise enough to select an especially sturdy beast when thinking
of Tubby.
The pursuers were not all in a bunch, but scattered, according to the
ability of their mounts to maintain the killing pace. Undoubtedly, they
were urged on by the big cruel Mexican spurs, which, of course, every
cavalryman wore on his boot heels.
This might seem to be a trifling matter; but Rob knew better. If it
really came to a running fight, as seemed likely, they would profit by
the fact that only a minority of their pursuers could fire upon them,
the rest being either too far off, or else fearful lest they might hit
their comrades in advance.
Meanwhile they were approaching the big smoke that kept rising ahead,
and which must mean a burning bridge on the railroad, and perhaps a
stalled train into the bargain.
Rob found himself wondering what sort of reception they would receive
should they find a party of Villa's rebels holding out against the
Regulars. He had already laid his plans and communicated them to his
chums, so that each would know just what was expected of him in the
emergency.
Already several shots had been fired by the leading horsemen, but as
they were still pretty far distant, and as it is next to impossible to
do any serious business with a gun while going at such headlong speed,
of course these were sent after the fugitives more as an act of bravado
and alarm, than in the hope that any bullet might find its mark.
At the same time it was not very pleasant for the scouts to hear those
leaden messengers singing so merrily through the air over their
heads,--for all the world like so many bees or locusts, as they
afterward decided.
Every time a gun sounded, Tubby involuntarily ducked his head and tried
to flatten himself out on the neck of his horse, an utterly impossible
thing, on account of his build. He seemed to think that they must always
pick him out for a target, because he offered such a fine mark.
"Guess you'd do the same, too," he called out to Andy, when he saw the
grin on the other's face as he turned in time to see one of these
performances, "if you made a shining mark like I do! And being in the
rear adds to my chance of stopping one of those lead pills. Anyway, I'm
going to do the trick right along, no matter what you think, Andy
Bowles!"
"And you're right about that, Tubby!" called Merritt. "Even when you lie
down flat you make a better mark than most of us do sitting up!"
"Keep your breath, fellows; you may need all of it!" Rob called out just
then, and this stopped the controversy.
Rob urged his horse alongside that of the Mexican guide.
"How are we going to come out of it, Lopez?" he asked anxiously. "Will
they get at us before we make the smoke?"
The experienced eye of the other had before now accurately measured the
distances; and doubtless he was figuring matters out at the time the
scout broke in with this leading question.
"If no bad luck," Lopez assured him, "we surely come to the burning
bridge before the wolf pack doubles us up, young señor."
"By bad luck you mean an accident?" Rob demanded.
Lopez shrugged his shoulders and cast a swift, meaning look back at poor
fat Tubby, who was belaboring his tired mount with the flat of one hand,
and urging the beast on and on. Evidently the guide had been half
expecting an accident to happen in this quarter for some time, and was,
in fact, surprised that the clumsy scout had held on so long; but then,
he did not know what a stubborn nature Tubby possessed.
"Si, señor, a horse might slip, and toss his rider; or it may be a
passing bullet happen to go in the wrong place and do damage. Who can
tell? But let us hope it will not so bad as that prove. We are doing
well; and the smoke, it is not so far away as it seems!"
All of which must have been poor satisfaction to Rob, who from that
moment found himself enduring new agonies every time he twisted around
to see whether Tubby still held forth.
The horses were reeking with sweat, and while Rob did not pretend to be
as experienced in such matters as a cow puncher would be, still even he
understood that this sort of thing could not be kept up much longer.
Only for the presence of that smoke and the hope that they might run
upon some friendly rebels at the burning bridge, he would have made up
his mind that there was no other way for them to escape save by turning
at bay and engaging in a regular fight with those persistent pursuers,
who kept dogging the heels of their horses mile after mile, bent on
running them down.
"What do you think of our chances for finding some of Villa's men
ahead?" Rob asked the guide several minutes later. They were still
keeping up a furious pace and fairly holding their own, though none of
the horses in the race could be said to be running as fast as half an
hour previously.
"It is an open chance," Lopez replied with another shrug.
"But the Federals set the bridge on fire; and after doing that they
would hardly hang around, because this part of the country must be
swarming with rebels, who would be drawn to the burning bridge by the
smoke. Is that the way you figure it out, Lopez?"
"You have said what was in my mind, young señor," came the reply; "and
that is why I have kept moving on all this while. Had it not been the
hope of finding friends, before now they must have felt our lead."
"Then we're doing the right thing in trying to get to the bridge before
letting them come up on us," Rob decided. And after that he bent his
whole energy to carrying out the plan he had arranged.
He even fell back so that he could ride alongside Tubby; for Rob had
often heard that no chain can be any stronger than its weakest link;
and this must surely mean Tubby, in their case. If any accident befell
the party, the chances were as ten to one it would spring from the fat
scout.
And so Rob, believing in being prepared to meet things as they come
along, even went so far as to figure out just what his course of action
must be in case Tubby gave signs of falling off his horse, or the animal
tripped in its headlong flight.
"It's only a little further, Tubby, so try your best to hold out!" he
kept saying. "See, there's a spur of the hill jutting out, and the
railroad comes around that. On the other side must be the Carmen River,
where the bridge that is burning crosses. Just one more push and we'll
be there in great shape. You're doing fine, I want to tell you, Tubby; I
never thought you had it in you; and we're bound to get through this
ride all right, believe me!"
No doubt this sort of encouraging talk did more than a little to keep
Tubby from throwing up the sponge entirely; for he was close upon the
point of complete exhaustion, and ready to own himself "all in."
"Try to think and tell me, Tubby," Rob went on earnestly, "where you've
got those signal flags you brought all the way down here, because you
said they might come in handy. I can use one right now, I believe."
"Reach in that pocket on the side of my bag toward you, Rob," replied
Tubby in a gasping whisper. "You ought to find the lot there."
This Rob managed to do in spite of the fact that both horses were
galloping at headlong speed.
Just then they cleared the point of the hill that jutted out close to
the railroad track; and there in front of them lay the cause of the big
smoke. The bridge was afire, just as they had believed. There was also a
train stalled on the side near them, with its engine headed toward
Juarez. Doubtless this was the one of which the boys had heard, which,
starting from Chihuahua, laden with refugee Mexican families wanting to
seek shelter over in Texas, had been lost somewhere on the way, held up
by burned bridges, and possibly by other things in the way of damage
done to the locomotive by the Federal's marauding cavalry parties.
As soon as Rob could manage to see what lay ahead, he felt cheered by
the sight; for behind the cars he discovered dozens of men with guns,
who seemed to be making a barrier of the train and exchanging long
distance shots with some enemy perched upon the higher ground,
undoubtedly Federals.
There seemed nothing for the scouts to do but to join their fortunes
with those men of Villa's command who were holding the Regulars at bay.
So, without slackening the speed of their horses a particle, the little
party galloped forward, Rob leading the van and wildly waving one of the
signal flags, which, being white with a small red center, could be
looked upon as a flag of truce, and would surely keep the rebels from
firing on them.
It must have astonished those fellows who were making a rampart of the
stalled train to discover thus a party wearing khaki uniforms so like
those of the American soldiers across the border, coming at headlong
speed toward them, and being fired after by a pack of pursuers whom they
readily recognized to be the regular troops of Huerta!
And since all enemies of the prevailing government must be looked on as
friends to their cause, the Constitutionalists, as the rebels liked to
call themselves, made no attempt to halt the advance of the Boy Scouts.
They held their fire, waiting until the hard-pressed fugitives could
reach shelter, when explanations might be in order.
But the unseen Regulars perched among the rocks on the hillside must
have discovered that those they were engaged in fighting seemed to be
receiving unexpected reinforcements, for they turned their attention to
the oncoming riders, and once more the nerve-racking zip-zip of passing
bullets gave Tubby a cold chill.