DELL, OF THE “DOUBLE D.”
“Waugh! Jest lis’en ter thet, will ye? Ther pizen noise seems ter
come from every which way. Trailin’ tracks ter ther place whar they
goes is er heap easier than trailin’ er noise like thet ter ther
place whar et comes from. Whoa, you gangle-legged ole hide-rack,
y’u! Stand still fer a brace o’ shakes while I tries ter sense ther
location o’ thet distressin’ whoop.”
The speaker was Nick Nomad. As was quite frequently the case when
Nomad was journeying alone, he was conversing with himself.
The “gangle-legged old hide-rack” to which he referred was his
horse--a rangy, ranch-bred cayuse, all leather and springs.
Horse and rider were in a high-walled basin, formed by the opening
out of a gulch through which ran the wagon-trail from McGowan’s mine,
to the town of Phœnix, in Arizona.
At its widest, the basin would measure probably an eighth of a mile
across. Its bottom was level as a floor and overgrown with mesquit,
greasewood, and thorn.
Nomad, entering the basin from the gulch on the north, was crossing
to the gulch on the south. He was close to the center of the basin
when he heard a prolonged:
“Whoo-yah-h-h!”
The walls of the basin caught up the sound and sent it echoing
and reechoing across the intervening spaces, the result being a
bewildering clamor coming from everywhere at once, and from nowhere
in particular.
“Sartain shore,” muttered old Nomad, cocking up his ear and puzzling
his brain, “thar’s another human in this hyar place, an’ he ain’t
feelin’ jest right in his mind, someways. But whar is he? Thet’s ther
p’int. Ther noises aire all tangled up, an’ et seems like thar was er
hundred voices callin’. We got ter make er try, anyways, ole hoss. As
er starter, we’ll bushwhack ter ther right.”
The trapper turned from the wagon-trail and spurred into the
chaparral. “Whoo-e-e!” he shouted, as he forced his way through the
brush.
The echoes of his call were taken up by another “Whoo-yah-h-h!” from
the unseen man, and the basin fairly roared with voices.
Nomad forced a passage clear to the basin wall on the right without
locating the person he was seeking. Thereupon he rode some fifty feet
southward, and cut clear across the basin.
Luck was with him that time, for he came upon a low structure of
cottonwood logs, bolted strongly together at the corners, and with
other logs bolted to the top, the whole forming a sort of cage.
At one side of the cage was a door of strong, two-inch planks,
fastened to slide up and down in grooves. This door was closed, and
the top edge of it weighted down with a big stone.
“Waugh!” exclaimed Nomad, pulling up his horse. “Ef et ain’t er
b’ar-trap I’m er Piegan.”
“Whoop-yah-h-h!” came the howl of distress once more, and there was
not the least doubt about its being inside the trap.
Nomad slid down from the saddle, dropped to his knees, and peered
between the logs. Then he began to laugh.
Inside the trap, likewise on his hands and knees, was a caged man.
The man had fiery red hair, and his broad face was fringed all around
with fiery red whiskers.
“Divil take yez!” snorted the man in the trap, with a brogue that was
rich and fluent. “A laughin’ matther, is ut? Come insoide a whoile,
like mesilf, an’ see av yez can laugh.”
“Sufferin’ varmints!” chuckled the trapper. “Et’s an Irish b’ar,
blamed ef et ain’t.”
“Begorry,” came the response, “Oi’m Irish, an’ proud av bein’ from
th’ ould sod, but it’s no b’ar Oi am. Rub yer eyes, an’ look ag’in.
Did yez iver hear a bear _talk_? G’wan wid yer funnin’.”
“I’ve seen er b’ar do everythin’ but talk. What’s yer name, my
unforchnit friend?”
“Golightly.”
“An’ how did ye come ter git in ther trap?”
“Och, wurra, Oi didn’t come t’ git in. Oi was on me way t’ Phanix,
an’ was shtopped on th’ road an’ put in.”
“Whar ye from?”
“Th’ Three-ply Moine. Oi do be worrukin’ f’r McGowan.”
“I don’t riccolect seein’ ye at ther Three-ply, Golightly, an’ I’ve
been thar fer two er three days.”
“Oi’ve seen yersilf there, wid Buffalo Bill an’ th’ little redshkin
yez call Cayuse. Are yez goin’ t’ let me out, or are yez goin’ t’ set
there chinnin’ wid me on me hands an’ knees an’ me back half-broke?”
“I’m goin’ ter let ye out, pilgrim,” said Nomad, getting up and
walking to the door of the trap.
Throwing off the stone, he lifted the door, and Golightly rolled out,
with a shout of satisfaction at finding himself free.
Clenching his fists, he shook them in the air; then, jumping high and
knocking his heels together, he stooped down and patted the earth
with one hand.
“Yez hear me?” he roared. “Oi can lick th’ blackguards wid me wan
hand tied behind me back!”
“Ef ye’re able ter do thet, Golightly,” grinned Nomad, “fer why did
ye let ther blackguards put ye in ther b’ar-trap?”
“Oi was taken by surprise, that’s whoy!” glared Golightly.
“Tell me erbout et,” returned the old trapper, climbing into his
saddle and hooking one knee about the horn.
“This is th’ way av ut,” went on Golightly, ramming some tobacco into
the bowl of a short clay pipe and scratchin’ a match on the sole
of his boot. “McGowan is expectin’ av his girrul from ’Frisco th’
marnin’, an’ it was mesilf he sint t’ Phanix t’ mate her. McGowan
was busy an’ couldn’t go himsilf. Oi got an early shtart wid th’
buckboard, an’ whin Oi was goin’ through here, a mon wid a mask over
his face--bad cess t’ him f’r th’ blackguard he is!--rode out av th’
bushes an’ grabbed th’ two horses by th’ bits.
“Simulchuniously, an’ whoile Oi was arguin’ wid th’ mon t’ let go av
th’ bits, two more wid masks rode out, wan on each soide av me, laid
hold av me collar an’ tipped me aff th’ sate av th’ buckboard. They
had guns, d’ye moind, an’ sorry a thing had Oi but me two fists. What
could Oi do? I ask yez that. Not a thing, says you, but do as yez
was bid. I did that same, an’ was poked into th’ thrap, th’ door was
closed, an’ th’ blackguards wint aff wid th’ buckboard.”
“Thet was a pizen queer move, Golightly,” remarked Nomad, the humor
of the situation dying out with the serious business that seemed back
of it.
“Queer, is ut? Oi do be callin’ ut worse than queer. What did they
want iv th’ ould man’s buckboard? An’ what did th’ ould man’s girrul
do whin there was no wan t’ meet her at th’ thrain in Phanix?”
“Ther ole man’s darter’s name is Annie, ain’t et?”
“Annie McGowan--ye’ve shtruck ut. She’s been visitin’ in ’Frisco, an’
was expected home this marnin’. By th’ same token, she was expectin’
some wan from th’ moine to mate her, an’ that same was what McGowan
tould me t’ do--which Oi didn’t do, account av bein’ penned up in th’
thrap f’r six mortil hours. Och, wurra, but Oi can’t ondershtand ut
at all!”
Golightly had not lighted his pipe. He scratched half a dozen
matches on his boot-sole, but each time he became interested in
his explanation, and allowed the match to flicker out between his
fingers. It was a keen expression of his state of mind.
“I knowed McGowan was expectin’ his darter from ’Frisco,” said Nomad,
“an’ thet he’d sent some ’un ter meet her; but why ye’d be stopped
on er peaceful journey like thet thar, an’ ther buckboard took erway
from ye, is somethin’ I don’t understand. What use hev a lot er men
on hossback fer a buckboard, anyways? An’ why was they masked? A
feller don’t wear a mask onless he wants ter hide his identity; an’
ef he hides his identity, ye kin bet yer moccasins thar’s somethin’
onlawful up his sleeve.”
“Where are yez bound f’r, Nomad?” asked Golightly.
“Phœnix. Buffler, an’ Leetle Cayuse, an’ me aire startin’ fer Fort
Apache. Leetle Cayuse an’ Buffler will start from ther Three-ply this
arternoon. Hevin’ er piece o’ bizness ter attend ter in Phœnix, I
started on ahead.”
“What had Oi betther do? Go on t’ Phanix, or back t’ th’ moine?”
“Ef Miss McGowan was comin’ on ther mornin’ train----”
“She was that.”
“Then she reached Phœnix three hours since, an’ prob’ly hes gone
ter ther hotel. Yore cue, Golightly, is ter mosey back ter ther
Three-ply, an’ report what’s happened. Someway, I don’t like ther
looks o’ things. This underhand work may p’int ter some big villainy
er other, an’ McGowan ort ter be informed o’ et as soon as possible.”
“Oi do be sizin’ av ut up in th’ same way, Nomad; but it’s severeal
moiles back t’ th’ Three-ply, an’ Oi’ll be some toime coverin’ th’
ground on foot.”
“Ye’ll not kiver the ground on foot, Golightly, fer I’m goin’ ter
give ye a lift. I’ll erbout-face an’ make front on thet Three-ply
camp, so’st ye kin give McGowan ther nub o’ this diffikilty in short
order. Climb up behind me.”
Nomad kicked his foot out of one of the stirrups, and Golightly
was just mounting, when a clatter of hoofs reached their ears from
southward.
The trapper hoisted himself in his saddle and looked across the tops
of the bushes toward the gulch opening at the south side of the basin.
“Waugh!” he cried, startled; “thar comes er gal on er white pinto,
slashing erlong ter beat four of er kind, with two handy boys in
masks in hot persoot! Take er look, Golightly! Is thet Annie McGowan?”
“Annie! Jest from ’Frisco in that rig? Niver! That’s Dell, av th’
Double D Ranch--a fri’nd av Annie McGowan’s.”
“Whoever she is, Golightly, she needs us, an’ we’ll cut her out o’
thet bunch in er couple er jerks. Hang on, kase I’m goin’ ter plow
through ther chaparral at top speed.”
Pointing straight for the wagon-trail, the old trapper made quick use
of his spurs, and the double-burdened horse crashed away on the jump.
By the time Nomad and Golightly had reached the wagon-trail, Dell
of the Double D was well to the north of the basin. The old trapper
and the Irishman thus came out of the scrub between her and the two
pursuing men.
Facing about in the trail, old Nomad unloosened “Saucy Susan” and
“Scoldin’ Sairy”--as he called his forty-fours--and the result, as he
afterward expressed it, was “shore comical.”
The masked pursuers, evidently, were not expecting interference, and
the sudden materializing of the trapper and the Irishman from the
bushes was in the nature of a disagreeable surprise.
Although their faces were masked, it could easily be seen that they
were ruffians of the border brand--the sort who can be very brave
when there are two of them in pursuit of a woman, but immediately
experience panic when the odds are more nearly equal.
The bullets fired by the trapper went into the air, and the horses
of the pursuers were stopped so suddenly that the men on their backs
almost went over their heads.
Frantically the two ruffians whirled about and went slashing along on
the back trail, plying whip and spur for all they were worth.
To follow them was the last thing Nomad would consider, with his own
horse so heavily burdened.
“Aire them plug-uglies two o’ ther gang thet put ye in ther
b’ar-trap, Golightly, and run off with ther buckboard?” asked the
trapper.
“Faith, they look like ut,” answered the Irishman. “They didn’t shtop
t’ tell us whoy they took th’ buckboard.”
“Nary, they didn’t,” chuckled Nomad. “Mebbyso they’ll send their
explanations by mail. Let’s see what ther young woman has ter tell
us. What did ye say her name was.”
“Dell av th’ Double D Ranch.”
“Dell, hey? Ain’t thar nothin’ more to et?”
“Dauntless, Dell Dauntless, Oi belave, is her full name, but nobody
iver calls her that. F’r ivery wan in these parts she’s Dell--Dell
av’ th’ Double D.”
Nomad, after watching the two masked men disappear in the gulch, had
turned his horse the other way.
“Dell Dauntless,” he muttered, his eyes on the girl as she came
riding back on her white cayuse. “Waal, thet’s er great name. Et
somehow tickles my fancy like, an’ appeals ter my imagination. Et
makes Dauntless Dell, when ye turns et front-end to, an’ shore stacks
up ther clear quill. Ther name’s purty, an’ ther gal thet wears et is
ther same. She looks like she was got up ter play ther star part in
‘Ther Cowboy’s Pride,’ er some other mellerdrammer with lots er blue
fire and trembly music. Mebbyso ther name’s er false alarm, an’ thet
war-rig o’ her’n is on’y fer looks.”
“Arrah, ye’re wrong!” declared Golightly; “they do be sayin’ Dell av
th’ Double D is nervier than any mon in these parts. She can hit a
squirrel in th’ eye as far as she can git a sight av him, an’ she can
shtand aff twinty feet an’ throw th’ p’int av a bowie through anny
pip ye name in a playin’-card.”
“Waugh! Ye’re gittin’ me plum inter_est_ed; but go lightly, will ye,
ef thet’s yer name. What ye tell me is more’n ary woman kin do.”
“Yez don’t know Dell av th’ Double D,” muttered Golightly.
As she came loping easily toward the trapper and the Irishman,
perfect mistress of her horse and her lithe body swaying rhythmically
in the saddle, the girl was certainly a “picture.” Nomad, who cared
little for the sex feminine, felt a mighty stirring of admiration
in his old heart. Certainly, Dell of the Double D appealed to his
admiration for the picturesque.
The girl could not have been more than nineteen or twenty years
of age, and that she was athletic by training and temperament was
manifest in every graceful move.
Her blouselike waist was of softest doeskin, fringed and beaded and
secured about her trim waist by a carved Mexican belt, from which
depended an ornate knife-sheath, showing the pearl handle of a bowie;
her short skirt was of buckskin, likewise fringed and beaded; below
the skirt’s edge were laced tan leggings, and below the leggings were
small russet shoes, with silver spurs at the heels. Her hat was a
rakish brown sombrero.
Her riding gear was decorated with silver trimmings, which dazzlingly
reflected the sun.
The cayuse, white and pink-nosed, was as smooth as satin.
“A foine horse she has,” commented Golightly, in a low tone, as the
girl came nearer.
“Never seen er white bronk thet was wuth his keep,” demurred Nomad.
“Yez are lookin’ at wan now, thin,” insisted Golightly. “She do be
callin’ av him ‘Silver Heels.’”
“Silver Heels!” muttered the old trapper. “Et’s er name thet stacks
up fine with Dauntless Dell. Mebbyso thar’s somethin’ back er all
them fine feathers, but I won’t believe et till I’m showed.”
“Howdy?” called the girl, bringing Silver Heels to a halt. “Whyever
did you push into this chase and scare those two ombrays away?”
This last question was a startler. Nomad rubbed his chin and silently
turned it over in his mind.
“Golightly,” the girl went on, “you ought to have known better, even
if that grizzly old warrior in front of you didn’t.”
Nomad gulped hard on a swear-word. What was the girl trying to get
at, anyhow?
“Waal, I reckon!” growled the old trapper. “Say, I’ve been a grizzled
warrior fer three times as many y’ars as you’ve been on airth, an’
I ain’t never yit seen ther time when I wouldn’t interfere with two
masked tinhorns as was er chasin’ er lady.”
The girl leaned back in her saddle, stared a minute, then gave vent
to a rippling laugh.
“Glory be, Dell,” said Golightly, “yez hadn’t ought t’ talk like
that. This gint is Buffalo Bill’s pard, ould Nomad.”
A smile still twitched at the girl’s lips, but there was interest and
gratification in her blue eyes as she held out one gauntleted hand to
the trapper.
“Shake, old Nomad,” said she. “I’m Dell--Dell Dauntless of the Double
D Ranch. Any fellow who trains with Buffalo Bill must be in the list
of big high boys. You didn’t understand what I was trying to do,
that’s all. But I’ll forgive you. Your intentions were all right, I
reckon.”
Nomad took the small hand gingerly.
“What in blazes was ye doin’, miss, ef ye warn’t tryin’ ter git erway
from them thar masked riders?”
“Well, I was plugging along for the gulch,” said Dell; “the gulch is
rocky and crooked. I was intending to round in under the lee of a
boulder, draw a bead on the two masked men”--she slapped at a brace
of holsters as she spoke, such small holsters that they had, up till
then, escaped the trapper’s eye--“and make them tell me what their
game was.”
“Their game was ter ketch ye,” averred Nomad.
“But why? So far as I can tell, I never met the men before.”
“Them leetle poppers look ter be rale cute,” hazarded Nomad, “but
them fellers is so hardened, I’m afeared yer toy bullets wouldn’t hev
punctured ’em.”
“They’re sawed-off thirty-eights,” said the girl promptly, jerking
one of the weapons into view. “I can take your sizing, all right,
Nomad. You think I’m too much of a spectacle to make good in a fight.
I’ll admit to you that I don’t like rowdyism. I try to be a lady,
both at home on the ranch and when I’m abroad in the hills. But I
don’t think any the less of a lady because she’s able to take care of
herself. Do you?”
“Nary, I don’t,” said Nomad.
“I’m no second edition of Rowdy Kate or Calamity Jane; but when my
father died”--the girl’s voice trembled, and a mist came into her
fine eyes--“and left no one but me to look after mother and take care
of the ranch, it was up to Dell of the Double D to show her hand. In
self-defense I was obliged to learn the ways of the frontier. How
well I have learned them, Nomad, any one in these parts can tell you.”
Nomad pulled off his hat.
“Ye’re all right, Miss Dauntless,” said he, “an’ thet shot goes as it
lays.”
“I’m Dell to my friends,” said the girl, her eyes dancing again, “and
I want to be friends with old Nomad, and with Buffalo Bill, too.”
“Thar won’t be no sort er trouble erbout thet. But I’d like ter hear
more erbout them fellers thet was chasin’ ye.”
“They have been dogging my heels ever since I left Phœnix, picking up
my trail about the time I crossed the Arizona canal. I don’t know why
they did this any more than you. As I just said, I was going to make
a play to find out when you came to my”--she laughed--“my rescue.”
“Waal,” grinned Nomad, “now thet ye’re rescued, ye kin jest trot
erlong home ter ther Double D, an’ Golightly an’ me’ll pike fer ther
Three-ply.”
“I’m piking for the Three-ply myself,” said Dell.
“Thet so?”
“Sure. You see, I have important business with Buffalo Bill.”
“S’posin’ we ride tergether?”
“Fine!”
The girl whirled Silver Heels, clicked her spurs, and both horses
started off on an easy lope.