ANOTHER WARNING
Bud Merkel was about to hang up the receiver, with a blank and
uncomprehending look on his face, when Babe caught the black rubber
earpiece from him.
"Wait a minute, Billee!" called Babe into the transmitter. "See
anything of anybody around there? Anything suspicious?"
The others could not hear what the old cowboy's answer was, but Babe
soon enlightened them.
"He says it's all serene," Babe declared as he now hung up the
receiver. "Nobody in sight, an' the water is runnin' through the pipe
as natural as can be."
"I can't understand it!" declared Bud. "It was almost as dry as a bone
when we left last night."
"But it's running in here from the river dam," said Nort.
"Then there must have been a break somewhere in the tunnel natural
water course," declared Bud. "Well, if it mended itself so much the
better. But that doesn't explain this," and he held out the scrawled
warning. "And if the water stopped once it may stop again."
"Yes," agreed Babe, "but if anybody wanted to stop it they'd have to do
it either at this end, where the pipe takes water from the river, or at
your end, Bud, where it delivers water to your reservoir."
"Unless somebody stopped the stream inside the tunnel," suggested Dick.
"Then it would back up here at the river end," said Nort, quickly, "and
it hasn't done that."
"No, it hasn't," agreed Bud. "It sure is queer. I'm beginning to
think there may be more in that black rabbit than I believed first."
"What rabbit is that?" asked Babe.
"The one Old Billee said would bring me bad luck," Bud answered.
"Well," he went on to his cousins, "we might as well go back to camp.
We can't do anything here."
"If you've got water that's all you want in Flume Valley," declared
Babe. "There isn't a finer place t' raise cattle in all th' world than
there--if you have _water_!"
"And if you haven't--you might as well quit!" spoke Bud.
"You eliminated an earful that time," the assistant foreman stated.
"But I reckon it was just a little break, inside th' tunnel, an' it
filled itself up natural like. You won't have any more trouble."
"I hope not," spoke the boy rancher. "Are you going on back to Diamond
X, Babe?"
"Not until I find that bunch of strays from Square M. They're too
valuable t' let slip."
"Especially to let Hank Fisher, or Del Pinzo, slip them away,"
exclaimed Bud as he and his chums left the store where they had been
telephoning.
"Not so loud! Not so loud!" cautioned Babe.
"Why not?" Bud wanted to know, when they were outside.
"'Cause one of Hank's men was in there! He'll be sure t' tell what you
said, Bud."
"Let him! I'm not afraid of Hank, or his tool Del Pinzo, and I'd just
as soon either one would know what I think of 'em!"
"Don't be too brash; don't be too brash!" counseled Babe. "But they
sure are both bad actors--Del an' Hank!"
There was nothing more that needed to, or could, be done at the Pocut
River end of the flume, part natural, part artificial, which supplied
Bud's new ranch with such a vital necessity as water. The stream had
been dammed just above the intake pipe--not completely dammed, but
enough to provide the necessary head of water.
As Nort had said, had the stream been stopped purposely or by accident
inside the tunnel, the water would have backed up and run out around
the pipe, flowing into the river below the dam. But this had not
occurred.
"If it doesn't happen again we'll be all right," spoke Bud, as he rode
back with his cousins, making an easy pace along the trail that led
over Snake Mountain and down into Flume Valley. "But if the water
stops running again----"
"Let's go through the tunnel; it's the only way to be sure!"
interrupted Nort.
"I'm with you!" exclaimed Dick.
"It would seem to be the only way," agreed Bud. "Well, we'll hope this
is the end of my black-rabbit bad luck, and look for success, now that
you fellows are here. Cracky! But we'll have some good times, and
there'll be plenty of work, too!"
"How many cattle you got?" asked Nort.
"About five hundred," Bud answered. "Course you have a share with me,
that your dad bought, but we don't own 'em outright yet. My dad still
has a mortgage on 'em."
"But if we have luck we can clear that off; can't we?" asked Dick.
"Sure, this year, maybe," assented Bud. "I never saw steers fatten so
fast as ours have since I brought 'em to Flume Valley. I reckon the
land, being without water so long, raises a specially fine kind of
grass. Of course, there's always some at the far end of the valley,
good grass, too, but when there wasn't any water for the cattle to
drink there wasn't any use trying to raise stock there. But now it's
different."
"And all we want is for the water to stay," added Dick.
"That's all," chimed in his brother.
With Buck Tooth trailing behind, the three boys took the mountain trail
and reached their camp near the reservoir that evening. They found Old
Billee and Yellin' Kid waiting for them, these two cowboys having been
assigned by Mr. Merkel to help his son in the lad's new venture.
"Well, yo' got back, I see," remarked Old Billee as he greeted the
lads, the Indian going off by himself, for he was rather taciturn in
his manner.
"Yes, we're here," admitted Bud. "But I can't understand that water
coming back so unexpectedly."
"Are you sure it stopped running?" asked Yellin' Kid in his usual loud
voice.
"Sure!" declared Bud. "Didn't Buck see it--or, rather, he didn't see
it, for there wasn't any water to see coming through the pipe--only a
few drops."
"I wouldn't take his word," declared Old Billee. "Not that Buck would
actually lie, but those Indians are queer."
"Oh, we all saw that the water wasn't running," declared Nort.
"Well, it was when I got here," stated the old cowboy. "And there
wasn't a sign of anything wrong. But if there had been I'd expected
it, 'count of----"
"That black rabbit, I reckon!" broke in Bud.
"Perzactly!" declared Old Billee. "A black jack shore is bad luck, at
any stage of the game!"
But for a time there seemed to be no truth in this western omen.
Following the first mysterious disappearance of the water, and its
equally strange reappearance, peace seemed to settle down over Flume
Valley.
The steers and yearlings, with which Bud's father had entrusted him and
the boy ranchers, thrived and fattened on the succulent grass. Old
Billee, Yellin' Kid, with Buck Tooth's help, aided the boys in such
minor duties as were necessary to perform about the camp. The main
duty was looking after the safety of the cattle, to see that none of
them strayed beyond the wire fence at the far end of the valley.
Should any stray from the other egress, nearest Diamond X ranch, no
great harm would result, as they would still be on their owner's land.
But the farther, or north end, adjoined land owned by Hank Fisher, the
Double Z representative. And there were ugly stories current
concerning Mr. Fisher.
But as the days passed, and as the water still flowed through the pipes
and underground tunnel into the reservoir, Bud and his companions began
to think they had imagined more troubles than were really to occur.
"Guess that warning was only a bluff," said Bud, one day.
"And the black rabbit doesn't seem to have given you the jinx," added
Nort.
"But we didn't find that man you shot," put in Dick.
"I don't believe I shot him," declared Bud. "There was blood, sure
enough, but he may have stumbled, as, in fact, we saw him, and
scratched himself."
"But where did he disappear to?" asked Nort.
"Give up," answered Bud. "We'll have to take another look after we get
our first shipment out of the way."
For the first bunch of steers from the Flume Valley camp were to be
disposed of shortly.
It was the day when this shipment was to be made that Bud, awakening
early in the tent where he slept with his cousins, uttered an
exclamation of surprise as he caught sight of something on the blanket
that covered him.
"What's the matter?" asked Dick, sitting up.
"Did you leave this here?" asked Bud, as he held up a piece of board,
evidently part of a packing case.
"Me? No!" answered Dick. "What is it?"
"Either it's a joke, or it's the black rabbit getting in his work,"
answered Bud. "It's from an unknown enemy--another warning!"
And, as Bud held up the board, Nort and Dick could read, scrawled on
it, evidently with a fire-blackened stick, the words:
"Warning No. 2. When will you quit?"