IN THE SADDLE
"How far away are those mountains?" asked Tom, gazing in their
direction as they walked to the corral the next day.
"About forty miles," replied Bill. "They are called the 'Lost
Lode' hills, because there is said to be a rich silver mine in them
somewhere that the Spaniards worked hundreds of years ago. Just
where it is, though, no one has ever been able to discover."
"Wouldn't it be great if we could find it?" exclaimed Larry
eagerly. "Do you suppose your father would let us go and try?
Have you ever been over to the hills?"
"Lots of times on hunting trips. But we never explored them very
much. The trouble is no one knows whether the mine is on this side
or the other."
"But haven't they searched for it?" queried Tom, to whose mind a
silver mine suggested unlimited wealth.
"Lots of men have tried, but no one who has gone to find it has
ever been seen again," returned Bill. "They say the mine is
haunted by the ghosts of the old Spaniards who discovered it and
that they kill any one who goes near it."
At the suggestion of phantom Spaniards guarding the mine and
despatching those who found it the brothers laughed.
"You surely don't believe in ghosts?" inquired Tom, a tone of scorn
in his voice. "Who started the story about the ghosts, anyhow?"
"I don't know," responded the elder of the Wilder boys, rather
disappointed that the legend did not make more of an impression on
his friends. "We heard it when we came here. The cowboys all
believe it, and nothing would make them pass a night in those hills
if they could help it."
But ghosts were something in which the two brothers had been taught
not to believe, and Tom exclaimed:
"Huh! I'll bet some one has found the mine and started these
stories to keep other people from going there. Maybe there are
three or four mines," he added as his lively imagination began to
work.
"It's all right for you to laugh; you haven't been in the hills,"
snapped Horace. "If you'd heard Cross-eyed Pete tell about the
night he was camping there and was scared away by hearing men
shooting you might think differently."
"Just the same, I'd be willing to go and hunt for it," persisted
Tom.
"And so would I," chimed in his brother. "I say," he continued,
"why can't we go on a hunting trip? We needn't say anything about
trying to find the mine. Then, if we didn't, no one could laugh at
us and say we got scared."
The refusal of the boys from Ohio to believe in the haunted mine
had at first nettled Bill and Horace, but they had always been keen
to hear or see phantoms, and at Larry's proposal of the hunting
trip they became enthusiastic.
"It will be great sport, if father will let us," assented Horace.
"Come on, we'll ask him."
And abandoning their intention of roping ponies, they turned back
to the house in search of Mr. Wilder.
Finding him on the piazza, they lost no time in laying their plan
for a hunting trip before him.
As he beheld the eager faces and noted the lithe, supple bodies of
the boys, in whose eyes shone the light of fearlessness, the
ranchman replied:
"I have no objection, if you don't go beyond the foothills. Bill,
you remember the trails I showed you last spring, don't you?"
"Yes, sir."
"All right, keep to them. You boys certainly ought to be able to
take care of yourselves. Go and tell Hop Joy to put up some grub
for you. You had better camp on the plains to-night, so you won't
be able to shoot your food."
Delighted at the thought of going on a hunting trip, the boys
hurried away to the Chinaman.
"Golly! You boyee go shootee?" exclaimed the celestial when he had
received the orders to pack their food. "No flaid ghostee?"
"Of course not," replied Horace. "There's no such thing as ghosts,
Hop Joy."
"Mebbe so, mebbe not; no be too sure," grunted the Chinaman.
"Plete, him say they be."
But the boys did not linger to argue the matter, and only waiting
to see that Hop Joy put in a quantity of doughnuts, went to get
their rifles and shells ready.
To their surprise, when they returned to the piazza, they found the
ranchman busily overhauling his guns.
"I reckon I'll go with you," he explained. "I haven't been hunting
for some time, and as everything is quiet I can get away for three
or four days as well as not."
"Oh, good! Hooray!" exclaimed the boys.
And Horace added: "Now we won't have to worry about getting lost."
Not long did it take the lads to clean their rifles and fill their
cartridge belt with shells.
"Have you two got any knives?" inquired Mr. Wilder, looking at Tom
and Larry.
"Sure," replied Larry, and he told of the old gold miner's presents
and his advice about always carrying the pieces of thong with them.
"Silas is no fool," smiled the ranchman. "If you remember all he
told you, you won't get into trouble. Still, I think it would be
just as well for you to let me put your money in my safe. Then you
surely can't lose it."
"That's what father told us to do," said Larry as he and Tom
removed their buckskin money bags and gave them to the ranchman.
"We forgot it, though."
"Speaking about forgetting, what about the German boy?" asked Mrs.
Wilder, who had come to learn the cause of the preparations.
At the mention of Hans the four lads looked at one another in
dismay. But the ranchman came to the rescue, saying:
"From all Larry and Tom say, I don't reckon he'll be keen on
hunting. You can let him help Ned."
"Ned's our handy man," explained Horace in a whisper. "He drives
the grub wagon to Tolopah, and to the boys in their camps."
"Well, here comes the wagon now," observed Mrs. Wilder as she
caught sight of the big white-covered wagon, called a prairie
schooner in the old days, bobbing over the plains about a mile away.
"Oh, don't let's wait," protested Horace. "We can saddle up and go
and meet them. I'll make my pony dance and perhaps that will scare
Hans so he won't care to go."
"All right," laughed Mr. Wilder. "Bring up the ponies. Get
Buster for me."
Running to the wagon shed, the boys gathered the saddles, bridles,
some oats and pans and started for the corral.
Opening the big gate, they entered, closed it and then threw their
saddles on the ground.
"Always close the gate before you start to get your ponies,"
instructed Bill. "Sometimes they cut up, and if they get out onto
the prairie it's the old Harry of a job to catch them again.
"Now put your oats in your pans. Watch Horace and me and you'll
see what to do."
When they had prepared the oat bait, the two Wilder boys began to
beat on the pans, calling Buster and the other ponies by name.
The animals, which were at the farther end of the corral browsing,
lifted their heads and then came trotting toward them, halting
about ten feet away.
"Swish your pans so they can hear the oats," whispered Bill.
Slowly the ponies approached, as though deciding whether they
preferred their oats or their liberty.
"Come, Blackhawk! Come, Buster!" called Horace.
The boys set the pans on the ground. For a moment the ponies eyed
them and then trotted up, the eight crowding one another to get at
the four measures.
"Now's the time," breathed Bill.
In a trice the bits were thrust into the ponies' mouths and the
leather over their ears.
Lightning plunged back, but Larry grabbed the reins just in time
and held him.
"Push the pan to him," directed Horace, and, as he smelled the
oats, the pony grew still and was soon munching contentedly.
After catching his own mount, Bill had bridled Buster, and as soon
as the oats were devoured, all five were saddled with little
trouble and the boys were quickly on the backs of four of them,
Bill leading the pony for his father.
It required but a few minutes to make fast the saddle bags Hop Joy
had filled with food, tin plates, cups, knives and forks, coffee
pot, sugar and coffee and to tie on their sleeping blankets.
Then they buckled on their cartridge belts, slung their rifles
across their shoulders and again mounted.
By the time they were ready, however, the grub wagon was coming
into the yard.
"Where's Hans?" gasped Larry, the first one to discover that there
was only one occupant.
With a broad grin suffusing his face, the driver cried:
"Whoa!"
As the horses stopped Mr. Wilder, fearing that the boy had been
made the butt of some mad prank, said severely:
"If anything happened to that lad, I shall hold you responsible,
Ned. Where is he?"
"Gone with his brother Chris."
"His brother!" cried Tom. "Did his brother come back?"
"He did--yesterday. Hans found him, and such a meeting nobody ever
see before. The brother is going to another town and Hans with
him. They started to-day."
The knowledge that Hans had found his brother was a great relief to
Tom and Larry, and they lost no time in saying so.
"If you feel that way, then it surely is all right," declared the
ranchman. "We're going into the hills for a few days hunting, Ned.
If you need me, you'll find me somewhere on the 'Lost Lode' trail."
"With them tenderfeet?" inquired the handy man, eyeing Tom and
Larry doubtfully.
"Don't take them for easy, Ned. They put the laugh on Gus Megget,
so I reckon they can take care of themselves in the hills and on
the Half-Moon, too," he added with an emphasis which was to act as
a warning to be passed along to the cowboys.
"So it's them two I heard 'em talkin' about in Tolopah? Howdy,
gents! I sure takes off my bonnet to you," and Ned swept his
sombrero good naturedly from his head. "Say, you two are the only
topic of conversation in Tolopah about now. Couple of passengers
told what you all done, and now everybody's telling everybody else.
So it was you kids put the kibosh on Gus Megget. Phew! I hope I
don't get you riled up." And clucking to his horses, Ned drove on
to the wagon shed.
"When you go into Tolopah, you'll own the town," smiled Mr. Wilder,
looking at the brothers. "You see, you are famous already."
But Larry and Tom only laughed, while the latter exclaimed:
"I'd rather find the Lost Lode than fight Megget."
"So my boys have told you about the mine and the ghosts, eh?" And
shaking his bridle, the ranchman waved good-by to his wife and
cantered away, followed by the others.
For a few minutes they rode without talking, the Wilder boys a
trifle envious of the reputation their friends had achieved and the
chums trying to get accustomed to riding with a rifle bumping their
backs.
They soon got the swing of it, however, and, as the ponies settled
into an easy, steady lope, Tom exclaimed:
"Larry, we're in the saddle and on the plains at last."
"Like it, what?" queried Horace.
"It's what we've been dreaming of for months," declared Larry.
"Only, I say, Mr. Wilder, let's drop Megget. All we did was to get
away from him."
"As you like," smiled the ranchman, "but that's something."