THE HOLD-UP
When Wadley made to Jack Roberts the offer he had spoken of to his
daughter, the face of that young man lighted up at once. But without
hesitation he refused the chance to manage the A T O ranch.
"Sorry, but I can't work for you, Mr. Wadley."
The big Texan stiffened. "All right," he said huffily. "Just as you
please. I'm not goin' to beg you on my knees to take the best job in the
Panhandle. Plenty of good men want it."
The frank smile of the Ranger was disarming. "They don't want it any
worse than I do, Mr. Wadley. I'm not a fool. Just because we had a
difference oncet, I'm not standin' on my dignity. Nothin' like that.
You're offerin' me a big chance--the biggest I'm ever likely to get.
When you pick me to boss the A T O under yore orders, you pay me a
sure-enough compliment, an' I'd be plumb glad to say yes."
"Well, why don't you?"
"Because the Rangers have got an unfinished job before them here, an'
I'm not goin' to leave Captain Ellison in the lurch. I'll stick to my
dollar a day till we've made a round-up."
The cattleman clapped him on the shoulder. "That's right, boy. That's
the way to talk. Make yore clean-up, then come see me. I won't promise
to hold this job open, but I want you to talk with me before you sign up
with any one else."
But the weeks passed, and the Dinsmores still operated in the land. They
worked under cover, less openly than in the old days, but still a
storm-center of trouble. It was well known that they set the law at
defiance, but no man who could prove it would produce evidence.
Meanwhile spring had made way for summer, and summer was beginning to
burn into autumn. The little force of Rangers rode the land and watched
for that false move which some day the Dinsmores would make to bring
them within reach of the law.
On one of its trips in the early fall, the Clarendon stage left town
almost half an hour late. It carried with it a secret, but everybody on
board had heard a whisper of it. There was a gold shipment in the box
consigned to Tascosa. A smooth-faced Ranger sat beside the driver with a
rifle across his knees. He had lately been appointed to the force, and
this was one of his first assignments. Perhaps that was why Arthur
Ridley was a little conscious of his new buckskin suit and the
importance of his job.
The passengers were three. One was a jolly Irish mule-skinner with a
picturesque vocabulary and an inimitable brogue. The second wore the
black suit and low-crowned hat of a clergyman, and yellow goggles to
protect his eyes from the sun. He carried a roll of Scriptural charts
such as are used in Sunday-Schools. The third was an angular and
spectacled schoolmarm, for Tascosa was going to celebrate by starting a
school.
Most of those on board were a trifle nervous. The driver was not quite
at his ease; nor was the shotgun messenger. For somehow word had got out
a day or two in advance of the gold shipment that it was to be sent on
that date. The passengers, too, had faint doubts about the wisdom of
going to Tascosa on that particular trip.
The first twenty miles of the journey were safely covered. The stage
drew near to the place where now is located the famous Goodnight cattalo
ranch.
From the farther side of a cut in the road came a sharp order to the
driver. Two men had ridden out from the brush and were moving beside the
stage. Each of them carried a rifle.
The driver leaned backward on the reins with a loud "Whoa!" It was an
article of faith with him never to argue with a road-agent.
Ridley swung round to fire. From the opposite side of the road a shot
rang out. Two more horsemen had appeared. The reins slid from the hands
of the driver, and he himself from the seat. His body struck the wheel
on the way to the ground. The bullet intended for the armed guard had
passed through his head.
In the packed moments that followed, a dozen shots were fired, most of
them by the outlaws, two by the man on the box. A bullet struck Arthur
in the elbow, and the shock of it for a time paralyzed his arm. The
rifle clattered against the singletree in its fall. But the shortest of
the outlaws was sagging in his saddle and clutching at the pommel to
support himself.
From an unexpected quarter there came a diversion. With one rapid
gesture the man in the clergyman's garb had brushed aside his yellow
goggles; with another he had stripped the outer cover of charts from his
roll and revealed a sawed-off shotgun. As he stepped down to the road,
he fired from his hip. The whole force of the load of buckshot took the
nearest outlaw in the vitals and lifted him from his horse. Before he
struck the ground he was dead.
In the flash of an eye the tide of battle had turned. The surprise of
seeing the clergyman galvanized into action tipped the scale. One moment
the treasure lay unguarded within reach of the outlaws; the next saw
their leader struck down as by a bolt from heaven.
The lank bandit ripped out a sudden oath of alarm from behind the
handkerchief he wore as a mask and turned his horse in its tracks. He
dug home his spurs and galloped for the brow of the hill. The other
unwounded robber backed away more deliberately, covering the retreat of
his injured companion. Presently they, too, had passed over the top of
the hill and disappeared.
The ex-clergyman turned to the treasure-guard. "How bad is it with you,
Art?" he asked gently.
That young man grinned down a little wanly at Jack Roberts. He felt
suddenly nauseated and ill. This business of shooting men and being shot
at filled him with horror.
"Not so bad. I got it in the arm, Jack. Poor old Hank will never drive
again."
The Ranger who had been camouflaged as a clergyman stooped to examine
the driver. That old-timer's heart had stopped beating. "He's gone on
his last long trip, Art."
"This schoolmarm lady has fainted," announced the mule-skinner.
"She's got every right in the world to faint. In Iowa, where she comes
from, folks live in peace. Better sprinkle water on her face, Mike."
Jack moved over to the dead outlaw and lifted the bandana mask from the
face. "Pete Dinsmore, just like I thought," he told Ridley. "Well, he
had to have it--couldn't learn his lesson any other way."
Roberts drove the stage with its load of dead and wounded back to
Clarendon. As quickly as possible he gathered a small posse to follow
the bandits. Hampered as the outlaws were with a badly wounded man,
there was a good chance of running them to earth at last. Before night
he and his deputies were far out on the plains following a trail that
led toward Palo Duro Canon.