FOLLOWING DARREL.
Frank and his chums, in riding from Tinaja Wells to Dolliver’s, passed
the mouth of the gulch only a few moments after Darrel had ridden into
it. Had Frank encountered Darrel, there is no doubt but that he would
have persuaded him against going on to Camp Hawtrey. In that event,
some very pretty maneuvers of Fate, calculated to benefit Darrel, would
have been effectually blocked.
But Merry and his two friends missed their new chum by a scant margin,
and galloped on to Dolliver’s. Dolliver, smoking his short black pipe,
was sitting in front of his little establishment, mentally considering
uncles and nephews, and the foolishness of a kid with a broken arm
trying to take a horseback ride before he was well able to be out of
bed.
At sight of Merriwell, Ballard, and Clancy, Dolliver’s reflections
went off at a fresh angle. He now began to concern himself with the
contrariness of human affairs in general.
“Hello, Dolliver!” Frank called, pulling in his black mount, Borak.
“How’s Curly?”
“Plumb locoed,” grunted the rancher.
“You don’t mean to say he’s out of his head?” gasped Frank.
“If he ain’t, then, by the jumpin’ hocus-pocus, I never see a feller
that was.”
“We’ll have to see about this!”
Frank slid from the saddle and started hurriedly into the house.
“No use lookin’ fer him in the wikiup, Merriwell,” said Dolliver, “kase
he ain’t there.”
“Not in the house?” demanded Frank, recoiling in amazement. “Where is
he, then?”
“Gone to Camp Hawtrey to make the old kunnel talk with him.”
“What do you know about that!” exclaimed Ballard.
“Thunder!” cried the astounded Clancy.
“How long since he left here?” asked Frank.
“Less’n half an hour.”
“Did he ride?”
“Sartain he did. No more business on a hoss than a two-year-old kid,
nuther. He’s wuss to manage than a case o’ the measles, anyways.
Howsumever, he would go. He reckoned he could talk with the kunnel and
smooth things out fer you.”
“How did he know matters had to be smoothed out for me?”
“Bleeker and Hotchkiss dropped in here on their way to the Hill, and
they cut loose about your troubles. That got Darrel all het up. Right
arter dinner, to-day, the kunnel himself blowed in here and tried to
git Mr. Bradlaugh on the telephone. But Bradlaugh was away on business,
I reckon. I wasn’t in the shack at the time, but I heerd the kunnel
sayin’ the business was important and that he’d call up later this
afternoon. Darrel was in the house, though, and tried to powwow with
the kunnel, but the kunnel wouldn’t have it. Runnin’ out, the kunnel
climbed his hoss and moseyed up the cañon. Nothin’ ’u’d do but Darrel
had to mosey arter him.”
“Here’s news, fellows, and no mistake!” breathed Merriwell.
“Curly wasn’t able to take such a ride,” growled Ballard, “and that’s
a cinch.”
“What does he think he can do, anyhow?” asked Clancy. “He’s not on the
colonel’s visiting list.”
“Have you any idea what he intended to do, Dolliver?” Merry went on.
“Palaver with that grouchy old uncle o’ his,” replied the rancher.
“Jode’s tryin’ to make the kunnel believe Darrel set you up to act like
you done. I allow that Darrel wants to disabuse his mind, thinkin’ that
if he’s out o’ it you’ll have less trouble comin’ to an understandin’
with Hawtrey.”
“Foolish!” muttered Merriwell. “He couldn’t make the colonel believe
any such thing, and it wouldn’t help if he could. I wish we’d get here
in time to head Darrel off. What’ll happen to him when he gets to Camp
Hawtrey?”
“I don’t opine he’ll ever git there,” and Dolliver shook his head
dubiously. “He wa’n’t able to sit a hoss, not noways.”
Frank hurried to Borak and leaped into the saddle.
“Only one thing to do, fellows,” he announced, “and that’s for us to
ride for Camp Hawtrey.”
“Bully!” exulted the red-headed chap. “That gang will sure welcome us
with open arms.”
“They will that,” agreed Dolliver. “Say, if you go to the kunnel’s
camp, jest now, ye’ll have the time o’ your lives.”
“All right,” answered Frank, “I don’t care how hot a time they give us
providing we can do something to help Darrel. Come on, fellows!”
He pointed Borak for the mouth of the cañon, and set off at speed.
Clancy and Ballard made after him.
The cañon trail was narrow and the riders were obliged to proceed in
single file. When they turned into the gulch, however, they were able
to ride stirrup to stirrup.
“I don’t like the prospect a little bit,” said Frank. “Now that Bleeker
and Hotch have left the Gold Hill camp, there isn’t a fellow there
that’s at all friendly toward Darrel.”
“Hawtrey’s there,” suggested Ballard. “Don’t forget that, Chip. Hawtrey
won’t have anything to do with Curly, but you can bet he won’t let Jode
rough things up with him.”
“That’s right, Pink. Darrel must be a little hazy in his mind to start
for the Gold Hill camp at such a time as this.”
“He’s trying to do you a good turn, Chip,” suggested Clancy.
“Sure he is—I give him credit for that—but the crazy old lobster can’t
do me any good, or himself, either. He ought to stay in the house for
another week yet.”
“Bosh!” returned Clancy. “Curly is all rawhide and India rubber. A
broken wing hadn’t ought to bother him much more than a mild case of
the mumps. You’ll notice we haven’t run across him lying along the
road.”
“He’ll stick it out, you can bank on that,” said Ballard. “He’s
probably in Camp Hawtrey this minute. That bunch would be pretty yellow
if they didn’t treat him right.”
Clancy had a sudden thought.
“Say, Chip,” said he, “we’re taking this hike to help Curly, but I
don’t think we’ll do him much good if we plunge full tilt into the
camp. They’re a suspicious lot, and they might think it a frame-up of
Curly’s. Suppose we reconnoiter a little before we show ourselves?”
“How’ll we reconnoiter, Clan?” asked Merry.
“The top of the gulch wall, about where we were yesterday, is a good
place for that.”
“I guess you’ve got the right end of the stick, Clan. If we’re to climb
the bank we’d better begin right here. Strikes me this is as good a
place as we’ll find, and it’s far enough this side of the camp so we
can make the climb without being seen.”
The slope was not steep, but it was easier for the boys to walk up the
incline and lead their horses. In perhaps ten minutes they had reached
the crest, and were able to take a comprehensive survey of the gulch
below.
“Jove!” exclaimed Merry. “There are two fellows on a bowlder down
there. See them? They are just below that chaparral of mesquite. One of
them looks like the colonel to me. Wonder if the other is Darrel?”
“Not on your life!” murmured Clancy. “The other is Jode.”
“Sure enough!” agreed Ballard. “We’d better lead our horses back from
the rim, and drop down on the rocks. If the colonel and Jode happened
to look up here, they’d see us.”
Ballard’s suggestion was carried out at once; then, on their knees, the
lads continued to peer downward. Presently the colonel and Jode got
up and began climbing. They passed well to the left of the chaparral,
angled across the face of the slope, and stepped upon a ledge that
jutted out from the gulch side.
“I’m next to what’s going on down there,” said Merry. “Remember what
Bleek told us, Clan, when I asked him where Jode got that dynamite for
the cartridge?”
“He said something about Hawtrey stumbling on a ‘prospect,’” was the
answer, “and that Jode was to fill a hole, and the colonel was to load
it and set it off.”
“That’s what the colonel is about to do. Let’s move down the gulch a
little way and find a place directly over the ledge.”
A hundred yards carried the boys to a spot above the ledge. Masses of
splintered granite and loose bowlders covered the slope between the
ledge and the crest of the gulch wall. The boys were able to look over
the intervening rocks, however, and get a clear view of the ledge level.
Colonel Hawtrey, on his knees, was at work capping a fuse and ramming
dynamite into the hole where the blast was to be set off.
“You’re right about it, Chip,” said Clancy. “The colonel’s going to
have a little blow-up, down there, and probably he’ll make a ‘strike.’
How many poor prospectors, do you suppose, have passed that ‘prospect’
by? That’s the way things work out, in this world. Here’s the colonel,
with more mines and money than he knows what to do with, just falling
right over a good thing. Now——”
“Look!” broke in Ballard, grabbing Frank’s arm and pointing downward
and to the left of the ledge. “See that long break in the gulch wall,
running from the top right down to that bunch of chaparral? Who’s that
looking out of it?”
“Darrel!” murmured Merriwell, astounded.
“Curly, as sure as you’re a foot high!” fluttered Clancy. “Now, what
the deuce do you suppose he’s up to?”
It was a surprising situation, and no mistake. Darrel, screened in the
rift, was cautiously looking out and keeping track of the movements of
the colonel and Jode.
“Curly wants to talk with the colonel,” said Frank, after a moment’s
thought, “and he’s waiting for Jode to get out of the way.”
“I could slip down that chute,” suggested Ballard, “and slide right
into Darrel. We could bring him up here, with us, and——”
“Wait till after the blast,” cut in Merry. “The colonel’s just touching
it off.”
“See Jode scramble for the tall rocks!” chuckled Clancy. “He’s not
going to take any chances on being knocked over by flying stones.”
“Neither is Curly,” added Ballard. “He has ducked down into the bottom
of that hole of his.”
“Two sticks of dynamite will lift a pretty big chunk out of that
ledge,” said Merriwell, “and before it lets go we’d better push back a
little. The charge——”
The words died on Merry’s lips. A bowlder, just above the ledge, had
slipped from its moorings and was rolling over and over, grinding and
crashing toward the ledge. The colonel had just risen from lighting the
fuse. He saw the bowlder, and tried frantically to get out of the way
of it. In his haste, he slipped and fell prone upon the ledge. The next
moment the bowlder was upon him!