INSIDE THE DUG-OUT.
Poor Oscar! This was a most unexpected and disastrous ending to the
expedition upon which he had set out with such high hopes.
What would his mother do now? What would be the verdict of the
committee, who seemed to have so exalted an opinion of his abilities,
and whose confidence in him had led them to place in his hands a
thousand dollars of the university’s money?
It is true that he still had funds at his command, but he had use for
them. If another mule must be purchased, where was he going to obtain
the money to pay his guide? It was a bad case, altogether, and almost
any boy would have been utterly discouraged. Oscar certainly was, and he
was on the very point of abandoning the whole thing in despair, when
something prompted him to say to himself:
“If I give up here, I must return that money; and how in the world am I
to do that?”
This thought frightened him, and made him almost desperate. He hastily
reviewed the situation, and in two minutes more had made up his mind how
to act.
“All right, Mr. Barker,” said he, giving back the note which the latter
had handed him to read. “If this is your mule it is nothing more than
fair that you should have him. Thompson,” he added, turning to his
guide, who had stood by, an interested listener to all that had passed
between the ranchman and his employer, “what will you take for your
pony?”
“Wal,” said the latter, suddenly straightening up and winking hard, as
if he had just been aroused from a sound sleep, “he aint fur sale, that
there hoss aint.”
“Mr. Barker,” continued Oscar, “have you an extra pony that you would be
willing to dispose of? I haven’t money enough with me to pay for him;
but I will give you an order on the colonel, which I assure you will be
honored.”
“No,” was the disheartening reply. “I have but one, and I can’t spare
him. But you don’t need a pony to carry you back to the fort, even if
you are a tenderfoot. You can easily walk that distance.”
“Who said anything about going back to the fort?” exclaimed Oscar,
almost indignantly. “I have not the slightest intention of going back. I
shall not allow this expedition to fall through for the want of a little
pluck now, I tell you. I’ll walk, since I can’t buy a horse, but it will
be toward the foot-hills. I’ll take what I can on my back; and,
Thompson, you will have to carry the rest. We’ll not stop here to-night.
We can easily make five miles more before it is time to go into camp,
and every mile counts now.”
“The foot-hills!” exclaimed the ranchman, who was plainly very much
surprised. “What are you going there for at this time of year?”
“I am going to hunt. I was sent out by the Yarmouth University to
procure specimens for its museum,” answered Oscar.
“_You_ were?” exclaimed the ranchman.
“Yes, _I_ was.”
Ike Barker looked toward the guide, who nodded his head in confirmation
of Oscar’s statement, whereupon the ranchman backed toward the little
mound of earth that had been thrown up when the steps were dug out, and
seated himself upon it.
“This beats my time all hollow,” said he.
“It is the truth, whether it beats you or not,” replied Oscar, who
showed that he could be independent if he was in trouble. “I have my
credentials in my pocket. I should have been successful in my
undertaking if I hadn’t been foolish, or, rather, unfortunate enough to
buy this stolen mule. I shall have to leave my chest behind, after all.
Mr. Barker, can I hire you to take it back to the fort for me?”
“Not by a long shot!” exclaimed the ranchman, suddenly jumping up and
seizing Oscar by the arm. “Thompson, you turn your pony loose and
unhitch that mule. You come into my den with me, Mr.—Mr.—What’s your
name?”
“Preston—Oscar Preston. But I don’t want to go into your den.”
“Well, you’ll go, all the same. What sort of a man do you suppose I am,
anyhow—a heathen?”
Before Oscar could reply, the ranchman, having tightened his grasp on
his arm, dragged rather than led him down the stairs, ushered him into
the dug-out, and seated him on an inverted dry-goods box that stood in
the corner near the stove.
“There!” said he. “Sit down and talk to me, while I go on getting
supper. I didn’t expect company to-night; and, as I have sent most of my
grub and all my sheep off to the hills, I can’t give you as good a meal
as I could if you had come a week ago. I should have been on the way to
the hills myself by this time, if it hadn’t been for that note I found
fastened to my door. How is everything in the States? Got any late
papers with you?”
The friendly tone in which these words were spoken surprised Oscar.
Could this be the same man who had pointed a loaded gun at his head a
few minutes before?
While his host was speaking, Oscar had leisure to look about him. He had
never before seen the inside of a dug-out, and he was not a little
astonished at the appearance of it.
It was really a comfortable dwelling, and not the dirty hole he had
expected to find it. There was plenty of room in it; and the furniture
it contained, although of the rudest description, showed that it had
been fitted up as a permanent abode.
There were two bunks beside the door; and in one of them a comfortable
bed was made up. The other was empty. The walls were covered by blankets
and buffalo robes; two small dry-goods boxes did duty as chairs, and a
larger one served as the table.
There was a small cupboard on each side of the stove, one of which
contained a few tin dishes, while the other, Oscar noticed with some
surprise, was filled with books.
A solitary candle burned in a bracket candlestick that was fastened
against the wall; but, as there was a reflector behind it, the interior
of the dug-out was well lighted.
The ranchman talked incessantly while he was busy with his preparations
for supper; but Oscar was too deeply engrossed with his own affairs to
pay much attention to him.
The loss of the mule weighed heavily on his mind; but, after all, it did
not trouble him so much as did the note which the ranchman said he had
found fastened to his “door.”
Oscar knew then, as well as he knew it afterward, that the note had been
written by his brother, at the dictation of Lish, the Wolfer, and that
it could have been written for no other purpose than to get him into
trouble with the ranchman; but why the Wolfer and Tom should want to get
him into trouble was something he could not divine. It was something
that baffled him completely.
Worse than all, he was obliged to keep his own counsel; there was no one
to whom he could go for advice.
He would have been glad to continue the journey that night; for he
wanted to get away by himself and think the matter over.
Presently the guide came in, having unhitched the mule and turned his
pony loose to graze, as the ranchman had directed.
He had but little to say while disposing of his share of the homely
supper that was speedily served up on the large dry-goods box, but left
the ranchman and Oscar to do the talking.
The little he did say was addressed to his employer, who learned that he
had attained to high rank during the last half-hour.
Although Oscar did not know it, he had made two firm friends by the
course he had pursued.
An experienced plainsman has not the slightest respect for a “gentleman
sportsman,” which is the title that hunters from the States generally
assume for themselves; and that was the reason why Big Thompson had been
so morose and taciturn ever since leaving the fort.
It would have been bad enough, the guide thought, to spend the winter in
the mountains in company with one of his own kind—a man upon whom he
could depend in any emergency, and who could relate stories of adventure
around the camp-fire as thrilling as any he could tell himself; but the
thought of passing long months in the society of a tenderfoot, and a
stripling, besides, was most distasteful to him.
He had consented to act as Oscar’s guide simply because he knew the
colonel wished him to do so, and because he had been made aware of the
fact that the boy had money to pay him for his services; but he would
much rather have remained near the fort, and passed the time in
idleness.
Now he seemed to have different opinions. A boy who could look into the
muzzle of a double-barrel with as little trepidation as Oscar had
exhibited, and who could hold to his purpose in spite of difficulties
and disappointments that would have disheartened almost anybody, must
have something in him, even if he was a tenderfoot.
Not being accustomed to such things, the guide did not know how to
acknowledge his mistake directly, but he could indirectly; and he did it
by dubbing Oscar “professor,” by which dignified title he ever afterward
addressed him.
That was Big Thompson’s way of showing his friendship; but the ranchman,
although he very soon fell into the way of calling Oscar by the same
title, showed his appreciation of the boy’s pluck and independence in a
much more substantial manner.