SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR
Dorothy’s eyes followed the direction of Tavia’s momentarily petrified
stare and she suddenly and sharply drew in her breath. There seated side
by side with their heads close together were Stanley Blake and the small
black-eyed man whom he had called Gibbons.
Dorothy felt extremely uncomfortable, but she retained her presence of
mind sufficiently to urge Tavia to go on as quickly as possible.
Tavia was quick to take the hint and, pretending they did not see the
two men and hoping that the latter would not notice them, they hurried
by. With relief they found themselves a moment later safe and
unrecognized in the dining car.
There was a short line of passengers awaiting admission to the tables
and Dorothy was greatly relieved when she and Tavia were finally
beckoned to places at the front of the car.
Facing each other across the table, their eyes spoke volumes but their
tongues were tied by the fact that they were not alone at the table, at
which were already eating two men in loud, checked suits and flashy
neckties.
Dorothy, facing the door of the dining car, watched it constantly in
apprehension lest the two men appear. Tavia, watching the direction of
her glance, understood her thought and spoke reassuringly.
“I don’t imagine there is any danger of meeting them here now, Doro,”
she said. “You remember they were always the first in the dining car on
the way out and probably their habits haven’t changed much since then.”
Dorothy nodded.
“Lucky for us we waited until the second call,” she said.
After that they spoke only of trivial things until the two men at their
table, traveling salesmen, by their conversation, got up and lumbered
fatly off.
Tavia found herself wondering with an inward chuckle why men who
indulged a passion for checked suits almost invariably were fat.
An anxious question from Dorothy brought her back to consideration of
the immediate problem confronting them.
“Do you think they are going to Desert City?” asked Dorothy in a voice
so low it could hardly be heard above the pounding of the train.
“I shouldn’t wonder if that were their destination, Doro mia,” agreed
Tavia reluctantly. “Having mentioned Garry’s ranch and being now bound
in the general direction of Colorado and Desert City, it seems only fair
to assume that their destination is more or less identical with ours.”
“If I could only find out what they are up to!” cried Dorothy, adding,
as her pretty mouth set itself firmly: “And I intend to find out, too,
before I get through with those rascals.”
“I have a shorter and uglier word for them,” said Tavia. Then she leaned
across the table toward her chum and asked with interest: “This begins
to sound thrilling, Doro, do you mind telling an old friend—if not a
trusted one—when and how you intend to start in the business of mind
reading?”
“I am sure I don’t know!” admitted Dorothy, as she stared absently at
her practically untouched plate. “It is one thing to determine on an
action and quite another to carry it out.”
“There speaks great wisdom,” gibed Tavia, in good-natured raillery,
adding with genuine concern as her eyes also focused upon Dorothy’s
plate of untouched food: “But why don’t you eat, Doro? One must, you
know, to live——”
Quite suddenly Dorothy’s eyes filled with tears and her lip quivered.
Tavia looked astonished and alarmed.
“Now what have I done?” she cried. “If I said anything——”
“Oh, it isn’t you,” Dorothy interrupted. “I was thinking of Joe.” She
stared across at her chum with tragic eyes. “Tavia, have you stopped to
think how Joe is going to—to—eat?”
“Why, with his mouth I—” Tavia began in her usual flippant tone, then
stopped short, staring at her chum.
“One doesn’t eat these days unless he pays for what he gets,” said
Dorothy bitterly.
“And Joe spent his last cent for railroad fare,” Tavia said, in a small
voice.
“Exactly,” retorted Dorothy. She gave a comprehensive sweep of her hand
toward the tempting contents of her plate. “Then with that thought in
mind, do you wonder that food chokes me?”
“Poor Doro!” said Tavia softly. “You surely have more than your share of
trouble just now. But you had better eat, dear,” she added very gently.
“It won’t do Joe any good for you to starve yourself, you know. You are
going to need all your strength for the business of finding the poor
foolish lad.”
Dorothy, practical and sensible as always, saw the wisdom of this and
forced down about half of her lunch and hastily swallowed a glass of
milk.
“I hate to go through that car again,” she confided to her chum, when
there was no further excuse for lingering.
“So do I,” confessed Tavia. “However, I think the waiter is of a
mercenary turn of mind. He hovereth over the check like a hungry hawk.”
“Your description is picturesque, if a trifle strained,” murmured
Dorothy, as she motioned to the waiter and took out her pocketbook.
“Your imagination does terrible things to you, Tavia.”
But in her heart she was mutely grateful that Tavia had been created as
she was with an unquenchable sense of humor and scant reverence for
solemn things. To her, trouble was merely a cloud before the sun that
would presently pass and leave the day brighter than ever. And one had
the feeling that if the sun did not come out quickly enough to suit her,
Tavia would find a way to hurry it!
On the way through their car Tavia was quick to notice that Dorothy made
no attempt to avoid the gaze of the two men; in fact, seemed rather to
court it. Tavia had a moment of intense admiration for her chum’s
ability as an actress. She would never have suspected it of Dorothy, the
sensible, practical and straightforward.
The handsome eyes of Stanley Blake discovered them immediately and he
rose with what should have been flattering alacrity.
Tavia noticed that his pleasure was for Dorothy and knew what she had
suspected from the beginning, that her chum had been the real object of
his admiration.
Gibbons did not seem quite so pleased to see them. Tavia noticed that
his eyes had narrowed in a surly and suspicious manner.
Dorothy answered quite sweetly and pleasantly Blake’s interested
questions concerning the number of their reservation, and after a moment
of light and amiable conversation, the two girls passed on, leaving the
men to stare after them, one with admiration, the other with suspicion.
“Well, now you’ve gone and done it,” said Tavia, looking at her chum
with dancing eyes when they regained their seat. “You couldn’t possibly
snub our gay fellow travelers after that lusciously friendly greeting.”
“I don’t want to—just yet,” returned Dorothy significantly.
At the next station the train stopped for a few minutes to take on coal
and water and Dorothy took this opportunity to send a second telegram to
Garry.
In this she told him of the presence of the two men on the same train
with her and Tavia and their probable destination.
She told him also of her anxiety concerning Joe and begged him to watch
out for the lad, saying that he had undoubtedly gone out to join him,
Garry, at Desert City by way of Dugonne.
Somehow, after sending this telegram, she felt easier in her mind
concerning Joe. Provided that the lad reached Dugonne in safety Garry
could be depended upon to _keep_ him in safety until she could get to
him.
As the train moved on again, Tavia settled back in her seat contentedly
and regarded the flying landscape with dreamy anticipation.
In her own mind Tavia had decided that Joe was either already safe with
Garry or soon would be, and she was preparing to enjoy the rest of the
trip.
“It will be great to see Desert City and a ranch again,” she said,
putting some of her thoughts into words for Dorothy’s benefit. “I wonder
if it will all look the same as it did when we left it, Doro.”
“A great deal better, probably,” said Dorothy, rousing herself from a
troubled reverie. “With Lost River to solve the irrigation problem all
the ranchland in the vicinity of our ranch and Garry’s should have
benefited a great deal. I shouldn’t wonder if we should see some
wonderful changes, Tavia.”
“I reckon that mining gang were sore when they couldn’t get Lost River
for their own schemes,” chuckled Tavia. “Do you remember Philo Marsh?”
“Do I remember him!” repeated Dorothy, with a shiver. “You might better
ask me if I can ever forget him!”
“Oh, well, he wasn’t so bad,” said Tavia, still chuckling. “He certainly
kept our vacation from being a dull one.”
The girls were recalling incidents of their first memorable trip to
Desert City and the Hardin ranch. The ranch had been willed jointly to
Major Dale and Dorothy’s Aunt Winnie White by Colonel Hardin, an old
friend of the Major’s.
It had been Colonel Hardin’s wish that Lost River, a stream which had
its origin on the Hardin ranch and which, after flowing for a short
distance above ground, disappeared abruptly into the earth and continued
for some distance underground, be diverted for the good of the farm- and
ranchlands in the vicinity.
An influential group of miners represented secretly by a lawyer of shady
reputation, the Philo Marsh spoken of by Tavia, had nursed quite
different plans in connection with Lost River. They needed the stream in
their mining operations and were determined to get it.
The Major and Mrs. White, however, were quite as determined to act
according to the wishes of Colonel Hardin. They successfully combated
more than one attempt by the mine owners to get possession of the river,
but it remained for the young folks, Dorothy, Tavia and the two White
boys and a young Mexican girl on the ranch, to outwit the final plot of
the unscrupulous men.
Lost River had consequently gone to the ranchlands in the vicinity as
Colonel Hardin had wished and there had followed a period of rare
contentment and prosperity for the farmers.
Garry Knapp’s land adjoined the Hardin estate and had been left to the
young Westerner by the will of his uncle, Terry Knapp.
The latter was an irascible, though kind-hearted, old fellow who had
quarreled with his nephew on a point of ethics and had promptly
disinherited him. Consequently, Garry was very much surprised and
affected to find that his Uncle Terry had repented of his harshness and
on his death bed had left the old Knapp ranch to him.
Naturally, Garry had benefited, as had his neighbors, by the diversion
of Lost River and there had seemed until lately nothing in the path of
his ambition to raise the finest wheat crop in all that productive
country.
Of course Garry had had enemies, Dorothy knew that. There were those who
envied him his good fortune and who would willingly have taken the Knapp
ranch away from him.
With the help of Bob Douglas, Terry’s foreman while he lived and now as
devotedly Garry’s, the young ranchman had been able to laugh at these
attempts.
But now it looked to Dorothy as though something more serious than ever
was afoot to rob Garry of the fruits of victory, and she was anxious.
“Wake up, Doro darling,” she heard Tavia hiss excitedly. “The villains
approach. Now is your opportunity to prove yourself a great melodramatic
actress if not worse.”