THE PHANTOM LINE RIDER.
For several days the weather remained fine, and the cattle were able to
get accustomed to their new range and become hardened.
The boys at the sign camps took things easy. In each sign camp were two
boys, one of whom rode days, and the other nights, when it was necessary
in bad weather to hold the cattle from drifting.
In order to keep in touch with one another the riders started from their
camps and met midway between, in order to exchange notes as to the
condition of the cattle and other things necessary to the welfare of the
whole herd.
There was another reason for this constant interchange of communication
between the camps.
Ted had received a warning from the town of Bubbly Creek, a small cattle
station, about twenty miles from the Long Tom Ranch, where there was a
cattleman's hotel, a few saloons, and an outfitting store, to look out
for the Whipple gang, which had its rendezvous in the Sweet Grass
Mountains.
Fred Sturgis, in the last letter Ted had received from him, had also
mentioned this gang of thieves and desperadoes, whose operations
extended from Canada, into which they made extensive raids when the
Canadian Mounted Police happened to be out of that part of the country,
as far south as the central portion of Montana.
"I have had considerable trouble with the Whipple gang myself," Sturgis
wrote, "but as yet I have never seen but one member of the gang to know
it. I have had plenty of cattle stolen, and have always attributed the
thefts to the Whipples. All I know about the gang is that it was founded
by a fellow named Whipple, an outlaw on the scout, who attracted to
himself a desperate gang of fugitives from justice who had taken refuge
in the Sweet Grass Mountains.
"I have never seen Whipple himself, but from those who claim to know him
he is described as an enormous man of prodigious strength, and a perfect
brute, who has forced his men into absolute subjection by his acts of
brutality toward them.
"With Whipple are a number of bad Indians, who have fled from the
various reservations in Montana after having committed all sorts of
crimes, from theft to murder. It is said that these are more to be
feared than the white men, for they are terribly cruel, and when they
get a victim he is tortured with all the horrible rites of the true
savage. They know that the moment they are caught that is the end for
them, so that they are reckless to the verge of insanity.
"I tell you these things, believing that you already know what ranching
in northern Montana means, and with every confidence in Ted Strong's
ability to take care of himself, and meet conditions when they appear.
All I can say is, go after them if they molest you. I and my boys fought
them so successfully that they gave us a wide berth toward the end. But
when they learn that new hands have taken hold of the Long Tom they may
think that they can start their funny business again.
"Knowing your reputation, and the ability you have shown in the past in
wiping out, or at least breaking up and scattering, bands of bad men, I
leave the Long Tom in your hands with the hope that when I take it over
again in the spring there will be no more Whipple gang, and that the
Sweet Grass Mountains will be as safe as one's own dooryard.
"A word in your ear about the Sweet Grass Mountains: It is known to a
few men in Montana, and a few others in various parts of the country
that somewhere in those mountains are rich mines of gold and copper, and
at various times men have brought out beautiful and valuable specimens
of sapphires and rubies in the rough, not knowing what they were, having
picked them up solely because they were beautiful and unusual.
"If it were not for the Whipple gang the mountains would have been
opened up to the prospectors long ago. Several prospectors, unheedful of
the warnings, have gone in, but none have ever come out of the Sweet
Grass Mountains.
"Whoever is at the head of the Whipple gang possesses more than the
usual share of brains, courage, and luck. Keep your eye peeled, and good
fortune to you."
This letter had been read to the boys one night in camp, and all were
instructed to look out for strangers on the ranch and to inform
themselves of the business of such.
One night Carl started from the sign camp to ride north to meet the
rider from sign camp No. 2, which lay nearer the mountains.
The camp in which Bud and Carl were stationed was camp No. 1.
The distance between the camps was about six miles, so that each rider
had to go about three miles to meet.
The night was clear and cold, and the air fairly sparkled with the frost
in the brilliant white moonlight. It was a glorious night, and Carl, in
a leather coat lined with fleece, and with a fur cap upon his head, and
his feet in thick felts, started away from the camp on his ride.
There was no wind, but the temperature was very low.
To the north the Sweet Grass Mountains loomed, a black mass against the
sky, while all about the world was carpeted with snow.
Carl had not progressed more than a mile from his camp when he saw a
dark object against the snow some distance in front of him.
At first he thought it might be a bush or a rock, so still it was in the
moonlight.
But he could not remember of ever having seen either a rock or a bush in
that part of the range.
Then he wondered if he was late at the meeting place, and that the other
line rider had got tired of waiting for him, and had ridden forward upon
his line to meet him.
This stimulated him to greater speed, and he pricked up his pony.
But as he got nearer the black blot on the snow there seemed to be
something unusual about it, and he unconsciously slowed his animal down
to a walk.
At last he got within hailing distance, and saw that it was a man on
horseback that he had been approaching.
The man on night duty at the second sign camp was a cow-puncher named
Follansbee, a short, reckless, yet amiable fellow, whom Carl knew well.
The rider who was awaiting him was an unusually large man, and bestrode
an enormous horse. The two were as if they had been carved from ebony,
as they stood silent and absolutely still, outlined sharply against the
dazzlingly white background.
Something inside of Carl began to sink as he went on, slower and slower,
his hand gripping the reins tightly, and holding back on them.
"Vot it is?" he was saying over and over to himself. "Vot it is? Dot is
not Billy Follansbee. Dot man vould make dree times of Follansbee, nit?"
Cold fear was slowly stealing over Carl, and he wanted in his heart to
turn and ride the other way.
But something seemed to draw him forward, and, try as he would, he could
not bring himself to turn back.
The man on the black horse could not be a member of the Long Tom force,
for Carl knew every one of them well, as a fellow will who has camped
with them for months on a cattle drive.
Now Carl was near enough to see the man's face, and he peered eagerly
forward to get a glimpse of it.
Then his heart sank lower yet, for the man's face was as white as the
snow beyond. There were no features; neither nose, nor mouth, nor
eyebrows, only a pair of black eyes gleamed out of that dead-white face.
Carl clutched at the horn of his saddle to keep from falling, he was so
frightened.
"Vot it is?" he kept repeating to himself.
His pony stopped of its own volition directly in front of this black
apparition, and Carl swayed in his saddle and would have fallen out of
it had he not clung to it with the unconscious strength of despair.
"Iss dot you, Follansbee?" asked Carl, in a weak, thin voice, well
knowing that it was not his line partner, but trying to break the spell
of fear that held him.
There was no reply, but the gleaming black eyes never left his own, nor
did the figure on the horse move a hair's breadth.
"Vy don't you say someding?" said Carl, his voice sounding like the
piping noise of the wind through a keyhole. "Speak someding."
Then it suddenly struck Carl that the man could not speak, because in
that white, immovable face there was no mouth to speak with, only those
black, blazing eyes.
"If you can't speak, make motionings," said Carl, in an imploring voice.
The sinister figure on the black horse slowly raised his arm, and
motioned Carl toward him, at the same time swinging his black horse
around and riding toward the mountains.
Chilled to the heart, Carl obeyed the signal, and sent his pony forward.
The man, apparition, demon, or whatever it was, sent his horse into a
gallop, and Carl, with no volition on his own part, followed at the same
speed.
But with the black and menacing eyes of the man with the dead face away
from his own, some small part of courage oozed back into Carl again, and
he remembered Ted's injunction to question every stranger met on the
range, and if he did not give a satisfactory answer to drive him off.
But Carl had not got over the fright the sight of that face and eyes had
thrown him into.
Suddenly his hand came into contact with the handle of his six-shooter,
and a thrill of daring ran through him.
He looked ahead at the back of the man riding only a few feet in advance
of him.
Should he take the chance? He knew that Ted or Bud or any of the boys
would do so. Why not he?
If the man was only human a bullet would soon settle the matter. But if
he should be a ghost or an emissary of the devil, as Carl strongly
suspected, nothing like a ball from a forty-five would do him harm.
This had the effect of staying his hand, and the revolver stopped
halfway out of its holster.
Then Carl thought of the boys, and what they would say if they knew that
he had not nerve enough to pot the enemy when he met him.
Carl was not the bravest fellow in the world, and he was intensely
superstitious.
Again the thoughts of the taunts of the other boys, should they ever
know that he lacked the nerve to take advantage of the moment, came to
him, and he gulped something hard that rose in his throat, and drew out
his revolver.
At that moment the man in black turned and looked over his shoulder, his
dead face gleaming white, out of which shone those terrible black eyes.
The revolver stopped suddenly in its upward course, and Carl's jaw
dropped as he stared in abject fear at that white and expressionless
face.
Then the man in black turned his horrible face once more to the fore,
and rode on.
Something inside of Carl seemed to snap, and a great glow of courage
swept over him. He fairly hated the sight of the grim rider in front of
him, who was taking him he knew not where, and whom he yet dreaded with
all his heart.
Up came the revolver again, and, almost before he realized what he was
doing, Carl was firing, straight at the back in front of him.
The target could not be fairer, that black mark against the snow.
The first ball struck, for Carl heard the thud of it, as if it had
struck and sunk into something soft.
The report of the weapon crashed through the still night, and was
carried far on the frosty air, reverberating and echoing back from the
distant mountains.
But the creature in whose body the ball had lodged did not seem to know
it. The head was not turned, the body did not lurch or sway.
Carl, now blind to everything but the terror that had taken possession
of him, fired again and again until every chamber in his revolver was
empty, pausing after every shot to note the effect.
That every shot was fair he was sure, for he could hear the sound of the
impact of the bullet.
The recipient of the bullets seemed not to know that they had been
fired, for he did not hasten or retard the progress of the horse, nor
did he take any personal notice that they gave him any discomfort.
But when Carl ceased firing he threw his head backward, looking over his
shoulder again, and from that hideous face without nose or mouth came a
gurgling noise that was like, and yet not like, laughter.
The laughter was worse on Carl's nerves than the silence, and he felt
himself grow sick at heart.
How could he expect to fight or escape from a devil impervious to the
balls from a Colt forty-five?
Then, to Carl's amazement and relief, the black horse sprang forward
over the snow so swiftly that it seemed as if it was flying rather than
running, but this probably was due to the uncertainty and the illusion
of the moonlight, and vanished into thin air, leaving Carl staring
open-mouthed.
It was several minutes before Carl regained his senses and knew that he
was sitting with his revolver in his hand, staring into space and seeing
nothing.
Then he rode slowly forward to the brink of a deep coulee.
Here was where he had last seen the phantom rider, for such Carl had at
last come to regard him.
Looking to the bottom of the coulee, Carl saw nothing but snow, where he
had expected to find a dead horse and rider.
"Ach, vot a country," he wailed. "Vy did I effer come to it? Mutter, I
vish you vas here to hellup your Carlos."
Then he heard a groan close at hand and looked about, expecting to see
the phantom rider by his side.
A short distance off lay a black splotch on the snow.
It resembled the prostrate form of a man. Had he, after all, killed his
horrible enemy? Cautiously he rode toward it. It was a man, and not the
phantom, and it looked very much like a cow-puncher, for it was clad in
leather coat and chaps, and there was a belt filled with cartridges, and
in the snow beside it lay a Colt forty-five.
This at least was human, and Carl climbed stiffly from his saddle and
bent over it.
He started back with a cry of surprise.
The man in the snow was his line partner, Follansbee.
That he was not dead was evident, for he groaned occasionally.
It was up to Carl to get him to camp as soon as he could, and when he
tried to raise the insensible form he was stopped by a gush of blood
from a wound in the breast.
But he heard a shot in the distance, then another, and another.
The boys had heard his shots, and were riding toward him with all speed.
Presently he heard the long yell, and in a few minutes Bud Morgan came
dashing toward him at top speed, and soon they were joined by Kit
Summers from sign camp No. 2, and the horror of the night was over for
Carl.