Chet Havens had been an apt pupil of old Rafe Peters, the hunter who was
now mine foreman at the Silent Sue; nor had he missed much that had been
told him by other plainsmen. Trailing and hunting was a hobby with the
boy, and each vacation for several years past he had spent the most of
his time on hunting trips.
With Digby Fordham he had taken many short trips around Silver Run; but
they had seldom encountered big game or gone many miles from their home.
This trip to Grub Stake was by far the longest the chums had ever taken
alone.
It was Chet’s trained eye that discovered the fact that a marauder other
than the wolves had been at their camp. Had it been left to Dig, who was
not observant, the presence of any other enemy than that which had
annoyed them in the evening probably would never have been discovered.
“Could it have been those Indians, Chet?” asked Dig, as his chum bent to
examine the ground closely.
“What Indians?”
“John Peep’s dog soldiers.”
“Nonsense! Those boys wouldn’t play us such a trick. Nor did they follow
us.”
“Huh! Didn’t know that anybody else was following us,” said Dig.
“Perhaps this fellow wasn’t on our trail. Maybe he stumbled on this
camp. The fire—or the wolves themselves—might have drawn him.”
Chet was thinking hard, however. At once, when he had discovered the
footprint which proclaimed a white marauder, he remembered what Amoshee,
the lame Cheyenne boy, had told him.
There was a strange man who was interested in the old Crayton mine and
therefore was interested in this trip to Grub Stake. This stranger had
joined forces with the discharged Tony Traddles. Chet had heard Tony
himself threaten Mr. Havens and declare he would “get square” with his
former employer.
Chet looked at the print of the large boot in the soft soil. Tony
Traddles might stand in boots like that. And if Tony was here, the man
who was trying to get hold of the old Crayton mine was very likely here,
too.
The condition looked serious to Chet Havens. He did not want to say
anything yet to his chum; but he did propose to keep a sharp watch
thereafter.
He was desirous, too, of learning all he could about the midnight
marauder. If the mysterious person had stolen only some of the deer
meat, why had he taken it?
And if he had come as near the camp as this, why hadn’t he come nearer?
“With both of us sound asleep,” thought Chet, with disgust, “they might
have come in and taken anything they liked. It puzzles me!”
He placed his hand upon the bosom of his shirt and could feel the stiff
packet of papers he carried in its accustomed place. His apprehension
was immediately relieved.
“Pshaw!” Chet muttered. “This might not have been Tony or that other
fellow at all. Just some tramp or the like on the trail, who was
attracted to our camp. Probably needed meat and helped himself.
“But it was funny he didn’t wait till daylight and come and ask for it.”
While he was turning these thoughts over in his mind he was moving
through the thicket, turning aside bushes, looking under bunches of
grass, peering here and there, to trace the tracks of the stranger.
And they were easy to follow—even for a youthful trailer like Chet
Havens. A spoor made in the night must be less carefully laid down than
a track by daylight. Not much chance to hide footprints while stumbling
through the dark.
Chet saw how the stranger had come into the thicket, and how he had
left. He had not gone near the camp and the place where the sleeping
boys lay. Chet was so sure of this that he did not attempt to examine
very closely the camp itself.
He was sure, however, the marauder had robbed them of the bulk of their
meat. The in trace and the out trace led directly up the slope from the
brook beside which they were encamped, to the trail they were following
to Grub Stake.
There, as near as Chet could make out, two horses had stood. He could
not discover, the sod was so cut up, whether both, or only one, of the
riders had dismounted.
He could picture the possible happening, however. In the night the two
riders had come along from the east. They were following the trail in
the same direction as the boys.
Hearing the noise made by the wolves over their dead brother, the
strange trailers stopped, and one of them had gone down to investigate.
The wolves had been frightened away by the coming of this person.
The stranger must have found the camp, but had circled about it—as his
footprints showed. Finding the meat, he had helped himself and returned
to the trail, then he and his partner had ridden on.
“The mystery of it is,” said Chet to his chum, when he returned to the
camp to find breakfast started, “why the fellow robbed us of meat and
didn’t try to take anything more valuable. I hope you see the value of
keeping watch now, Dig?”
“Yes, I do!” agreed his chum, with more seriousness than he usually
displayed. “I’ll take my medicine for that break last night, old man. If
I had kept my watch and waked you, nobody would have sneaked up on our
camp and stolen our meat.”
“Glad they left us this piece,” Chet said, slicing off steaks with his
hunting knife.
They seasoned the meat highly and rubbed tallow on both sides. Then they
broiled the steaks over the clear fire on one of the “contraptions”
which Dig had laughed at his chum for packing. They had coffee; but the
pancake flour was gone, and there were only a few “hard-breads.”
Hearty boys, however, do not need tempting dishes for breakfast. There
was still milk for the coffee, and as Dig said, they fairly “wolfed” the
venison steaks. The sun was not an hour high when they abandoned the
camping place and started for the trail.
Chet was particularly eager to reach the trail, for he wished to follow
the trace of the strangers who had robbed them; and when he saw Dig
fussing with Stone Fence, he exclaimed:
“For pity’s sake! don’t delay us to-day by fooling with that calf, Dig.
Do be reasonable.”
“What do you think he is—a race horse?” demanded the other boy, in
feigned amazement. “Can’t expect him to trot like Maud S., or
Yellow-dock. You surprise me!”
“I’ll surprise you if I ride off on Hero and leave you and your plaguey
calf to bring up the rear,” threatened Chet.
“You couldn’t be so heartless,” declared Dig. “I know you couldn’t. We
have been in peril together—Stone Fence and I. We came pretty near
being drowned, and then, there were the wolves. I feel toward him just
like a brother—Get out, you beast! want to butt me over again?”
They got under way and Chet set as brisk a pace as possible. He did not
want to leave his chum and the maverick behind; yet he was a little
vexed at Dig for being so obstinate.
The morning was delightful, however; nobody could hold anger at such an
hour. The boys whistled and sang and skylarked; the horses snorted and
stepped “high, wide and handsome,” as Dig called it; and even Stone
Fence trotted along the trail without much urging.
They had not to be on the watch for game this day, for they had enough
of the deer meat left to last them until over breakfast the following
morning. Yet Chet’s glance was ever roving over the plain as they went
on. No trace of the venison thieves was to be found.
The hills were behind them; the mountains were so far in advance that a
blue haze masked them. Nearby groves of small trees marked water-holes;
but there was no stream in sight.
[Illustration: They fairly “wolfed” the venison steaks.]
“Plain” did not mean in this case a perfectly flat surface. There were
coulies to break the monotony of the level trail, or ancient
watercourses to descend into and climb out of. Once they came to the
edge of a steep sand-bluff, after having ridden up a gradual ascent to
this eminence. From the spot they could see vastly farther than before.
It was from here that Chet spied something far to the north that
interested him. He carried a pair of field-glasses in a case slung from
one shoulder. He opened these and focused them on the round, black
objects that had attracted his attention.
With the naked eye they looked like beehives, and they did not seem to
move. But through the glass they were not conical, and they were
travelling toward the northeast. They all moved together, but slowly;
there could be no doubt of that.
“What’s got you now?” demanded Dig, finally noticing that his chum was
fixed in one position for a long time.
“Look here,” Chet said, offering him the glasses.
“Well, look out for Stone Fence,” returned Dig, and urged Poke nearer to
the bay mount, while he reached for the glasses.
“Fix them on those dots over yonder,” advised Chet. “Now, look good.”
Dig did so. In a minute he exclaimed:
“Cattle grazing!”
“Think so?”
“Sure. Maybe Stone Fence belongs to that herd.”
“But to whom does the herd belong?” demanded Chet. “We know well enough
that there is no ranch nearer than the Ogallala. Those are not strays
from the cattle trail. Weak and crippled cattle that are abandoned on
the march fall an easy prey to wolves and lions.”
“What do you make of it, then?” demanded Dig.
“Look at the round backs of them; the size of them, too. No cattle that
I ever saw are built like those. They certainly are not Texans or the
sun would flash on their horns now and then when they toss their heads.
It doesn’t look as though those creatures have any horns.”
“Oh, say!” cried Dig. “That’s going too far! We couldn’t see their horns
from here, if they had ’em a mile wide!”
“That’s stretching it some,” said Chet, laughing and reaching for the
glasses again.
“But what do you really think they are?” demanded Dig, growing more and
more excited.
“Going to find out,” announced Chet.
“Oh, goodness, Chet! You don’t think—”
“I’m going to find out what they are,” repeated the other lad firmly.
“By _all_ the hoptoads that were chased out of Ireland! you don’t mean
to say that you think those are buffaloes? Oh, Chet!”
“I certainly don’t think they are hoptoads,” grinned his chum. “I’m not
sure what they are, but I’m going to find out.” He slipped out of the
saddle, to ease it on Hero’s back and then cinch it up for a hard ride.
“Whew! you’re not going to leave me alone?” gasped Dig. “Why, it’s miles
and miles over yonder.”
“Come on, then.”
“But what’ll I do with Stone Fence?” blurted out Dig.
“Say, boy!” said Chet shortly, “this is the parting of the ways for you
and that red dogy. You’ve had your fun. Now this is business.”
“Have I got to decide between a perfectly good yearling calf and a
possible buffalo? Seems a hard case,” groaned Dig. “I bet I could sell
him for five dollars.”
“We’ve got to turn back a little on our trail to follow those beasts
yonder,” Chet said. “It’s likely we’ll hit the trail again about here.
Turn Stone Fence loose down in this sandy bottom. There’s enough grass
to feed him a year and I see a trickle of water yonder. He’ll be all
right. If he’s learned to love you, Dig, he’ll be waiting for you when
we return.”
“I’ll do just that,” cried Dig eagerly, and he urged the obstinate
maverick down the slope.
He was back in ten minutes after abandoning the surprised calf at the
foot of the bluff. The creature gazed after his human companions and the
horses with plain surprise in his bovine countenance.
Finally, as Dig and the black horse surmounted the rise, Stone Fence
spread all four of his legs and blatted after him like a cosset calf.
“What do you know about that? I hate to leave him in the lurch,”
declared Dig. “Some beast’ll get him, sure as shooting, Chet.”
“He was exempt from trouble long before you met him, Dig,” said Chet,
smiling. “I’m not sure that he considers you, even yet, his guardian
angel.”
They rearranged their outfit, tightened cinches, and remounted. The
black specks were quite visible to the naked eye; but they were moving
slowly northeast. The boys shook the reins and let Hero and Poke point
into the wind at an easy canter.