SHOTS FROM AMBUSH
The boy ranchers were very free with their surmises as to what might
portend the oncoming of the lone Indian. Youth is ever thus, eager to
guess instead of waiting for certainties. The older cowboys--Yellin'
Kid, Snake, Rolling Stone and those who made up the rescue
party--remained in silent contemplation of the approaching figure.
"He rides doggoned funny," observed Snake.
"Like a bag of oats," added Rolling Stone. "Looks like he'd fall off
any minute."
"Say!" began Bud eagerly, and then he stopped, as if he had thought
better.
"What's the matter?" asked Nort.
"Don't you know somebody who rides just like that?" Bud inquired.
"Some one we all know?"
Nort and Dick uttered exclamations. Bud's words were all that was
needed to set in motion a slumbering train of thought.
"Looks to me like he was hurt," affirmed Yellin' Kid. "Can't be one of
the Yaquis. They wouldn't be this near. And if they was they'd be too
big cowards to ride right for us this way."
"This isn't any unfriendly Indian!" declared Bud. "He knows us--and we
know him!"
"How come?" demanded Snake, half incredulously.
"Can't you see?" cried Bud. "It's our own Indian--Buck Tooth!"
"Wow!" shouted Yellin' Kid. "So it is! But I'd never have known him.
He's all togged out--got his war paint on!"
And, in very truth, Buck Tooth--for he it was--had donned a strange
garb. Wearing some of the clothing of civilization, he had ornamented
himself with dangling bits of cow-hide, with parts of tails dangling
from it. He carried behind him a collection of pans and camp
paraphanalia that rattled and banged about him as he rode forward. He
had stuck some feathers in his coarse black hair and he was a somewhat
laughable mixture of an American and Mexican Indian on the warpath.
"Ugh!" grunted Buck Tooth when he came within speaking distance. Not
that he ever spoke much, but this was his greeting.
"What'd you come away from the ranch for?" demanded Bud, for Buck Tooth
was a valued hand on a cattle place, and he had been left with the
somewhat small force to take charge of Happy Valley when the others had
started after the Yaquis. "What you doing here?" Bud wanted to know.
"Me after 'em too--Yaquis!" grunted the Indian. "Me catchum an'
shootum same like um shoot me!"
As he spoke, or, rather, grunted this out, he pointed to his left
shoulder. It was bound about with bloody rags, and in spite of his
stoicism the Indian winced as he moved in the saddle.
"Did the Yaquis shoot you?" cried Nort.
"Sure! I come after you--no could stay when fight to be done--and
Yaquis what you call plug me! But I plug one, two, three 'fore I quit!"
"Where was this?"
"Was there a fight?"
"Lead us there!"
"When did it happen?"
These were only a few of the questions hurled at Buck Tooth, whose name
was obviously well earned once you had looked at him. The old native
seemed stunned by the volley of interrogations, and sat stolidly in his
saddle while more were shot at him.
"Ugh!" he grunted in answer. "Fight yistidy--back there," and he waved
a dirty hand in the direction whence he had come.
"Sure they were Yaquis?" asked Snake.
"Sure; Me know--Me Yaqui once!"
"That's right!" fairly shouted Bud. "I forgot, for the time being,
that Buck Tooth is a sort of Yaqui Indian. But how comes it they fired
on one of their own tribe?" he asked.
"Bad Yaquis--no good!" was the answer.
"That's right--they sure are bad!" declared Rolling Stone. "I've had
dealings with 'em!"
"Did you see anything of their prisoners--young lady and young man?"
asked Snake. "Say, you'd better talk with him--you can sling his lingo
better than I can," and the cowboy appealed to Bud.
Thereupon the boy rancher talked to Buck Tooth in a way he knew his
Indian helper could understand, and Buck Tooth answered in like strain.
The Indian had been at Happy Valley ever since that venture had been
under way, and in that time Bud and the old native had come to
understand one another very well. Buck Tooth, it will be remembered,
was of aid to Bud and his cousins when the fight over the water rights
and the dam was under way, and the Indian helped fight Del Pinzo's gang.
"It's this way," Bud translated to the others, having finished
questioning the Indian. "He got sort of lonesome after we left the
ranch, and though I told him he must stay, he hiked off on his own hook
to join us. He took a roundabout trail so he wouldn't meet up with us
too soon and get sent back.
"Then, it appears, yesterday, he ran into a bunch of Yaquis, and they
fired at him. He got in among some rocks and fired back, and he says
he did for two or three. Maybe he wounded 'em, or maybe he made 'em
candidates for the Happy Hunting Grounds. Anyhow, after the fight he
managed to get on our trail, and here he is."
"But did he see anything of Rosemary and Floyd?" asked Nort.
"Not a sign. He says these Yaquis didn't have any captives," Bud
answered.
"How do you account for that?" Dick wanted to know, while rather a grim
silence fell on the others.
"Well, this may have been another party of Indians. Very likely was,"
Bud declared.
"That's right!" chimed in Snake. "The ones that captured Rosemary and
Floyd could hardly have gotten so far north as the ones were that gave
Buck Tooth that little reminder in the shoulder."
This opinion, coming from one who could reason out the matter, made
everyone feel less apprehensive.
"There must be two or three bodies of these Yaquis," went on Snake
Purdee. "They always split up after a raid. One party has Rosemary
and Floyd, and another engaged in a little set-to with Buck Tooth.
Being one of them he knew their fighting tricks and he left his marks
on 'em."
"It's queer one Indian would turn against the others of the same
tribe," spoke Nort.
"No, not in Buck Tooth's case," declared Bud. "He's a good Indian, if
ever there was one. And, as he says, these Yaquis may be a lot of
half-breeds, or a part of the tribe that is outlawed from the others.
I'm not standing up for the Yaquis," he hastened to add, "for I know
they've done a lot of dirty work. But this bunch may be worse than the
others. Anyhow Buck Tooth says so. And I'm glad he's with us. I felt
sorry after I left him back at the ranch."
"Yes, he'll be of service I reckon," asserted Snake, and Yellin' Kid
nodded in agreement.
The Indian's wound, which he had not troubled himself to dress, was
looked after with rough and ready, but effective cowboy skill and then,
a good camping place near a water hole having been reached, saddles
were taken off the weary steeds who began to roll about in welcome
relief.
The fires were made, grub cooked and as night settled down all prepared
for much-needed rest.
"Well, another day or two and we ought to catch up to 'em," observed
Bud, as he prepared to turn in with the others.
"That's right," agreed Yellin' Kid. "They can't have traveled any
faster than we did, and we took a shorter trail."
The night passed without any incidents of moment, though Nort nearly
gave a needless alarm when he sprang up, declaring that he was being
"roped" in the darkness.
But a light revealed that only a harmless snake was crawling over his
neck, an unpleasant enough sensation as you doubtless will admit, but
one not necessarily disastrous.
"Burr-r-r-r!" shuddered Nort, when he saw that it was a snake, and not
a lariat that had rasped him. "I'd almost rather it was a lasso! I
hate snakes!"
Then sleep was resumed.
The gray, cold and somewhat cheerless dawn was breaking over the
temporary camp when, as Buck Tooth toddled over to replenish the fire
for breakfast, there came sharp cracks of rifles from the surrounding
rocks and scrub underbrush, and the old Indian fell.
"Yaquis!" yelled Nort, springing for his gun.
"Ambushed!" cried Bud.
"Steady, everybody!" shouted Yellin' Kid and his strenuous voice,
rumbling and echoing through the silent morning, seemed to calm them
all. "Get down on your faces! Drop!" commanded the cowboy, while
puffs of smoke, flashes of fire and nerve-racking reports told that the
attack from ambush was in some force.