QUICK WORK FOR DARREL.
“There’s a little ginger left in me, pards,” murmured Darrel, sitting
up. “I’m not letting a busted wing put me down and out entirely.”
He got up slowly and stood beside Ballard.
“You’re to ride behind me, old man,” said Merriwell. “I’ll mount, Pink,
and then you help him up.”
Frank swung into the saddle, pulled the restive Borak down sharply, and
kicked a foot out of the stirrup for Darrel’s use. Darrel was game, if
ever a boy was. With a little aid from Ballard, he succeeded in getting
astride the horse, and held himself there with his right arm around
Merriwell.
“Can you hang on, Darrel?” asked Frank.
“Sure,” was the reply. “Just hurry, that’s all.”
With a shouted request for Ballard to follow, Frank headed Borak down
the gulch. Five miles lay between Tinaja Wells and the ranch at the
mouth of the cañon known as Dolliver’s. There was no horse in that part
of the country that could cover the ground more speedily than Borak.
Knowing that the ride was plain torture for Darrel, Frank sought to get
it over with as quickly as possible.
Although the broken arm swung cruelly during the rough ride, yet never
once did so much as a whimper escape Darrel’s lips. In less than
half an hour the treacherous trail was covered, and Frank drew up in
front of the ranch building. Both Dolliver and Clancy were in front
to receive the injured lad. It was well that they were there, and
ready, for no sooner had Borak been drawn to a halt than Darrel pitched
sideways from his back. He was caught in the outstretched arms of the
rancher and Clancy, and swiftly borne into the house.
Ballard came up, a moment later, and he and Frank dismounted, secured
their horses at the hitching post, and went in to learn what luck
Clancy had had with his telephoning.
“The doctor’s on the way, Chip,” said Clancy. “I got Mr. Bradlaugh
right off the reel. He said he knew the doctor was in town, and that
he would be snatching him toward Dolliver’s in less than five minutes.
That wasn’t so very long ago, though. You must have ridden like blazes
to get here so quick.”
The agony of the rapid ride down the gulch must have been intense
for Darrel. He had kept himself in hand pretty well until reaching
Dolliver’s, and then a wave of weakness had blotted out his endurance.
A bed in the main room of the ranch was ready for him, and he was
now lying in it, as comfortable as he could possibly be under the
circumstances.
“I’m putting you fellows to a heap of trouble,” remarked Darrel weakly.
“Oh, bother that!” answered Merry. “It’s mighty good to know that
you’ve come off with only a broken arm. You’ll not be laid up long, old
man.”
“I’m wondering how that rope happened to give way. It——”
“Don’t wonder about a blooming thing, Darrel. Wait till you feel
better.”
“I can’t get it out of my mind,” persisted Darrel. “Where did it break?
Did you see?”
“It broke in the place where you had it looped around the paloverde,”
said Ballard.
“Strike me lucky!” muttered Darrel, a puzzled look battling with the
pain in his face. “Why, it couldn’t have broken there! That rope was
Clan’s reata, and was as sound as any rope you ever saw.”
“That’s what happened, anyhow,” said Frank.
“I’m blamed if I can understand it!”
Frank and the other two were also at a loss to understand it. There was
certainly something queer about the breaking of that rope.
A little later, the hum of a motor car was heard along the trail.
“Mr. Bradlaugh has come over the road for a record,” remarked Clancy,
starting for the door. “But I knew he’d hit ’er up.”
When the boys reached the front of the house, the big car was just
slowing to a halt.
“Nothing but a broken arm, eh, boys?” asked Mr. Bradlaugh, as the
doctor tumbled out with his surgical case.
“That’s all, sir,” Frank answered.
“I didn’t catch the name over the phone. Whose arm was it? Not
Hannibal’s?”
“No, Darrel’s.”
Bradlaugh’s face suddenly clouded.
“That young rascal, eh?” he muttered.
Frank was quick to catch the significance of Mr. Bradlaugh’s remark.
“You know something about Ellis Darrel, Mr. Bradlaugh?” he asked.
“I know that his uncle made a home for him, treated him indulgently in
every way, and that he rewarded Hawtrey by forging his name to pay a
gambling debt. I was sorry to hear that you’d taken up with the fellow,
Merriwell, or that you were making room for him in the Ophir camp. He’s
a wild one, and won’t do any of you much good.”
Here was an impression which Frank was determined to change for one of
another sort. While Clancy and Ballard were helping the doctor set the
broken arm, and while an occasional groan of pain echoed out through
the open ranch door, Frank leaned against the side of the car and
earnestly explained a few things to Mr. Bradlaugh.
He went into the details of that thousand-dollar robbery, just as he
had done once before for the benefit of Colonel Hawtrey, and by the
time he had finished his defense of Darrel, Mr. Bradlaugh was almost
convinced that he had made a wrong estimate of “the boy from Nowhere.”
“Well, well,” smiled the president of the Ophir Athletic Club, “you’re
a red-hot champion of Darrel’s anyhow. If you’re so positive that the
boy has been a victim of some designing scoundrel, I can’t help but
think there may be some mistake about that forgery matter. Hawtrey’s a
very wealthy man, and the only ones he can leave his property to are
Jode Lenning and Ellis Darrel. If Darrel is out of it, then it all goes
to Lenning. There’s a point that demands consideration. I don’t know
much about Lenning except that he’s a pretty good sprinter, and seems
to be the apple of the colonel’s eye—now that Darrel appears to have
gone to the bad. If you think you’re doing the right thing by taking up
with Darrel, all right. I’m willing to trust to your judgment. And now,
tell me, how’s everything at Tinaja Wells?”
“Fine as silk,” Frank answered. “This accident of Darrel’s is the first
one we’ve had.”
“How did it happen?”
Frank recounted the details, in a general way, putting himself very
much in the background.
“Own up,” smiled Mr. Bradlaugh; “you’re the one who picked Darrel off
the shelf, and kept him from breaking his neck as well as his arm.
Isn’t that the size of it?”
Merriwell dodged the question as well as he could, and began telling
about Hawtrey’s visit to the camp, and his proposals. Mr. Bradlaugh was
in hearty agreement with the colonel.
“It’s up to you, boys,” said he, “to wipe out this bitterness between
the two clubs while you are out in the hills in neighboring camps. If
that’s accomplished, it will be something worth while. Remember, too,
all Ophir is counting on you to give us a winning eleven for the game
with Gold Hill.”
“I’ll do my best,” Frank answered. “Won’t you come in, Mr. Bradlaugh,
and meet Darrel?”
“He’s probably in no condition to make acquaintances now,” answered Mr.
Bradlaugh, shaking his head; “and, besides,” he added, “I’d a good deal
rather shake hands with him after you prove he’s innocent of forging
his uncle’s name.”
In an hour, the doctor’s work was finished. The broken arm had been
set and bandaged with splints, and there was an odor of drugs around
Dolliver’s and much relief and satisfaction in the minds of Frank and
his chums. There were no internal injuries, so far as the doctor could
see, and, in a month or so, Darrel was promised that he should be as
well as ever.
It was growing dark, by that time, and, as Frank knew the lads at the
camp would be wondering over the absence of most of those left on guard
duty, he and Clancy started back to Tinaja Wells shortly after Mr.
Bradlaugh had whirled away toward town with the doctor. Ballard was to
remain behind and look after Darrel.
It was eight o’clock when Merriwell and Clancy rode up on the flat and
got wearily down from their horses. As Silva hurried up and took the
mounts, a throng of lads surrounded the latecomers.
“Where the dickens have you fellows been?” demanded Hannibal Bradlaugh.
“Fritz has been howling his Dutch head off trying to get you to come to
supper. And that was all of two hours ago. The last seen of you, you
were on your way down the cañon to help Clancy and Ballard get that
football that Silva had kicked over the cliff. Some of us went down
there looking for you, but all we could find was a rope hanging from a
stunted tree on the cliffside. It was the biggest kind of a mystery.
And it only got deeper and deeper when Silva discovered that mounts
belonging to you, Ballard and Clancy had vanished from the herd. Come
across with the news, Chip. We’re all of us on tenterhooks.”
“Can’t we eat while we’re palavering?” wailed Clancy. “I feel as though
I hadn’t hit a grub layout for a week.”
“Come on mit yoursellufs,” said Fritz, “und haf a leedle someding vich
I peen keeping hot. Dit you get der pall?”
“Hang the ball!” answered Clancy, “we’ve had something else to think
of.”
While they ate, the two chums told of the accident to Darrel, and how
they had taken him to Dolliver’s and left him there with Ballard. There
was general regret expressed on every hand, for Darrel, greeted with
distrust when he had first reached the camp, was fast becoming a prime
favorite.
“While we were hiking back down the cañon,” said Handy, “we met
Hawtrey. We talked with him for a spell, and he batted up that
proposition of competing in a friendly way with the Gold Hillers. He
said you favored it. When we reached camp we found Lenning and Bleeker,
from Camp Hawtrey, waiting for us. They proposed a football game for
to-morrow afternoon, and I took them on for two fifteen minutes of
play. Didn’t think it best to tire the boys for a full game. I reckon,
though, that I’d better send over to their camp and call it off.”
“Don’t you do it, Handy,” protested Merriwell. “Let ’em come. I’m
particularly anxious to get better acquainted with Jode Lenning.”
Handy and Brad studied Frank’s face earnestly, for a minute, and then
they both chuckled.
“I see your signal smoke, Chip,” grinned Handy. “You’re thinking of
Darrel. All right, we’ll let them come; and I hope something happens,
during the set-to, that will be of some benefit to Curly.”