CHAPTER VI.
CAUGHT IN THE ACT.
Follansbee was carried to camp No. 2, where Bud, who was a pretty goodcow-camp surgeon, examined his wound. A ball from an automatic revolverhad struck him in the breast, but on account of the thickness of theclothing he wore, and the fact that he had on a heavy vest of caribouhide, in the pocket of which he carried a small memorandum book, theball had penetrated only a short distance.
While he had lost a lot of blood, and the shock of the ball striking hadcaused him to lose consciousness, he was not seriously hurt.
It did not take Bud long to extract the bullet and stanch the flow ofblood, and Follansbee opened his eyes and looked about wildly.
"Where is he?" he cried in terror.
"Whar's who?" asked Bud.
"The man what didn't have no face," cried the cow-puncher.
"Carl chased him avay alretty," said Carl, bending over his partner.
"All right, Carl. You saw him, too, did ye?"
"Sheur I sawed him, mit mine own eyes."
"Then it's all right," murmured Follansbee, sinking back on his bunk. "Iwuz afeared the boys wouldn't believe me if I told them what I saw."
When Follansbee sank into a deep sleep, due to his weakness from loss ofblood, the three boys sat before the fire while Carl told of hisencounter with the faceless man, and of the six shots which he had firedat him and the ineffective bullets which had struck his body.
As the story was told a hush fell upon Bud and Kit. They were deeplyaffected by the fact that this unknown and terrible menace was upon therange which they were compelled to patrol, and which not even the ballsfrom a heavy weapon could kill.
"I would hardly have believed it if both of you hadn't seen thecreature," said Kit. "It sounds too much like a pipe dream."
It was morning before Bud and Carl left Kit's camp and rode to theirown. Follansbee was apparently all right, and exhibited no symptoms offever, for he had the iron constitution of a seasoned cow-puncher, whoalmost invariably recovers as if by magic from a gunshot wound if themissile does not penetrate a vital spot or splinter a bone.
Follansbee, when he awoke from his sleep, told Kit of his meeting withthe "man without a face," as he called the man who had given him hiswound.
"I wuz ridin' at a pretty good clip along the line to meet Carl," hebegan, "when I see a feller standin' waitin' for me by the deep coulee,about three miles south.
"At first I thought it wuz Carl, but soon I see that it wuz too big ferthe Dutchman.
"I slowed down a bit, fer I saw it wasn't any o' our outfit. Ye see Ihad in mind what Ted said about that Sweet Grass Mountain gang, an' Iwuz some skittish.
"As I rode along slowly the feller on the black hoss made a sign as ifhe wanted me to foller him. But I didn't like the stunt, so I stopsstill an' rubbers at him.
"Two or three times he makes his motions, an' I don't do nothin' butshake my head.
"Kit, that wasn't no human bein'. It wuz ther devil as sure as shootin'.I started to draw my gun, but shucks, I ain't got no chanct ter make amove before thar was a crash, an' a blaze o' flame come from his chest,right about the middle, an' I felt the ball strike me, I heard a queersorter laugh, like a man bubblin' with his mouth in a basin o' water,an' then I went out, an' all I remember wuz fallin' out o' the saddle."
About noon of that day, Ted and Stella rode over from the ranch house ona tour of inspection, and stopped at Bud's camp, where they were toldthe story of Carl's strange encounter with the man without a face, towhich he listened in troubled silence.
When Carl was through with his story, Ted looked for a long time intothe fire without saying anything.
"Well, what do you think?" asked Stella, at last.
"I think it is the work of the Whipple gang," answered Ted.
"But why should they shoot Follansbee?"
"It is a piece of intimidation. Of course, they do not know us. Underordinary circumstances an apparition like that, followed by the shootingof a man, would cause a panic among ignorant men on a ranch. It is acinch that the Whipple gang has got it in for us, and this is just thebeginning of it. You will soon see other evidences of their work."
"But why should they hev it in fer us?" asked Bud. "We ain't never donenothin' ter them."
"I don't know, but I have several ideas."
"What are they?"
"There are two or three things to be considered. In the first place theyhave it in for the ranch on general principles. You know Fred Sturgissaid in his letter that he and his boys had driven the gang away fromthe ranch. That is reason number one. Then we are strangers in this partof the country, and they have seen us and have us sized up for a lot ofboys, and, therefore, easy marks for them. Again, we have a big bunch ofcattle, which Whipple and his bunch think we will not be able to protectagainst them.
"They may have learned that we are deputy United States marshals. Thatis enough to condemn us in their eyes. They are all old and fugitivecriminals, and if we knew them I think that we would find that they areall wanted in one or more of the States and Territories, and that theaggregate amount of rewards which have been offered for them, dead oralive, would amount to a neat sum. They do not need marshals in thispart of the country. There may be other reasons why they will make waron us, which we will learn later, but the ones I have mentioned aresufficient for them to make themselves very troublesome."
"So you think it is war, eh?" said Stella.
"I do, and I think that you will be a shining mark for them when theylearn that you are here. For that reason I would warn you to be verycareful where you go about the ranch, and especially ask you not to rideabout alone, and to keep away from the mountains."
"Oh, dear, and just when I had planned to explore those mountains fromone end to the other," said Stella, with a pout.
"Can't help it. You know what would happen if they should catch you andspirit you off as Shan Rhue did in the Wichita Mountains."
"Yes, I know, I'm a lot of trouble to you, Ted, but you know I don'tmean to be."
"Of course I know it, but if you run into danger, and expose yourself tothe attack of those who are avowedly our enemies, you run the chance ofbeing caught, and then, of course, it is our duty to get you out oftrouble."
"Well, I'll be good."
"The attempted killing of Follansbee was no accident," continued Ted."It was the work of an exceedingly shrewd man, who knows the moraleffect of his strange and mysterious appearance."
"Ain't it a ghost?" asked Carl, who had become all swelled up at thethought that he had made a ghost run away from him.
"I should say not."
"Den vy shouldn't mine bullets haf killed him?"
"I'm sure I don't know. That is why I say that he is a remarkably cleverman, and it is probably the cause of the power he wields that he is ableto do such things. It wouldn't surprise me any if some day we learnedthat your visitor was none other than the renowned Whipple himself."
"What are you going to do about it?" asked Stella.
"What can we do? We wouldn't know a single member of the gang if we wereto meet him. We don't know where they hang out, and if we did we knownothing about the Sweet Grass Mountains, and could not go to where theyare. All we can do is to watch the ranch house and the cattle as a catwatches a mouse, and if anything more, such as the shooting ofFollansbee, occurs, we will have to go on the warpath ourselves. But Idon't want to do that. We are out here to winter feed our cattle, andnot to fight."
"Shore enuff, but yer kin bet yer breeches I'm not goin' ter let no cavedweller or brush hider tromp onto my moccasins, an' turn ther othercheek ter be tromped on. Ther first feller o' that outfit I cotch sashayin' around me I'm goin' ter take a crack at him."
"Go as far as you like when it comes to an act of aggression on the partof one of them, but don't start anything, Bud, unless you can positivelybring it to a successful end."
"I reckon I'm some of a fox myself. They ain't set no trap what I've putmy paw inter yet."
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nbsp; Ted and Stella rode on to Kit's camp to see how Follansbee was gettingon, and found him doing nicely, but Stella laughed at the bandages Budhad put on the wounded cow-puncher, and insisted on redressing thewound.
Stella was a master hand at bandaging, because she was deft of hand andwas naturally sympathetic.
When she had finished with Follansbee, and had sewed his bandages sothat he could not rub or drag them off, he said he felt a hundred percent better already.
Then they proceeded toward the mountains, where the third camp, underthe direction of Ben Tremont, was situated.
It was almost the dying of the day when they left Ben's camp. He had notheard of the attack on Follansbee, and Ted made it an occasion to warnBen against the attacks of the Whipple gang, as he was in the mostexposed place, being so near the mountains.
When they turned their ponies' noses toward the south again it was toride through a part of the herd.
Ted noticed that the cattle were feeding well and that there was plentyof good, rich, well-cured grass, and that it was free of snow in bigenough patches to give the cattle ample room to graze.
As they were riding along Stella drew rein.
"What's the matter with that steer over there, Ted?" she asked, pointingto a steer that was dragging one of its hind legs.
Ted looked at the steer in question, which was moving slowly forward.
"See, there's another," cried Stella. "Why, I can see a dozen of themall limping in the same manner."
"That's strange," said Ted. "I wouldn't think anything of it if only onesteer had gone lame, but I can't understand a dozen."
They rode slowly toward the lame steers.
"Great guns," exclaimed Ted, bending low in his saddle to examine thesteers closely.
"What is it?" asked Stella excitedly.
"This is terrible," said Ted. "If this keeps up we might as well shootall the cattle and let them lie out here on the prairie the prey to thewolves. We will never get them back to Moon Valley."
Stella looked at him with an expression of consternation on her face.
"These cows and steers have been hamstrung," said Ted, with a tone ofsuppressed rage in his voice. "Any man who would do a trick like thatought to be shot down in his tracks like a mad dog."
"Hamstrung! I don't understand."
"Some inhuman brute has ridden up behind these crippled animals, andwith a sharp knife has cut the tendons or leaders behind the hoofs, or,rather, in the ankles, laming them and preventing them from being ableto follow a drive. Where would we be in the spring if any large portionof our beasts were so maimed?"
"What a brutal thing to do!" exclaimed Stella, in indignation.
"Hello, what's that?"
Ted rose in his stirrups, standing and shading his eyes with his handagainst the glare of the setting sun on the snow. With the other hand hewas pointing off toward the east, where the cattle were millinguneasily.
"Something wrong over there," said Stella.
They rode slowly in that direction to see what was disturbing thecattle.
As they went, Ted was looking for other hamstrung beasts.
"By Jove! this is getting worse and more of it," he exclaimed. "Seethere! That steer has had the tendons of his leg cut to-day. The woundis fresh. It has hardly stopped bleeding. I wonder----"
But before he had finished the sentence he applied the quirt to his ponyand was dashing through the herd, with Stella close behind.
He had seen something strange and out of the way in the milling herd,and while he thought he knew what it was he could hardly believe that itcould be true.
As he rode he drew his revolver, and broke it to see that its chamberswere filled.
Ted's face was pale and stern, and Stella saw at a glance that he wasterribly angry, and had the look in it that she had observed thereseveral times when he had seen animals being used with cruelty.
As he dashed into the milling herd he gave a cry of rage.
At the same moment a man sprang to an upright position in the midst ofthe cattle, and gave a cry of surprise.
Over his shoulders hung the fresh hide of a cow, with the skin of thehead and the horns protruding above his head.
He gave one swift glance at Ted, then threw the hide to the ground andset out at a run through the plunging beasts.
Ted was hampered by the cattle getting in his way, and was not makingmuch progress, but he was beating the horned beasts aside with hisquirt.
It was possible even yet that the man who was running from him wouldescape, and this was what Ted was trying with all his might to prevent.
Ted knew why the man was among the cattle protected from them by hisdisguise of the cow's hide.
He had been hamstringing them by the wholesale.
In one day the inhuman brute could destroy for range use a whole herd.
In the meantime, the cattle were growing wilder and wilder from the paincaused by the hamstringer's knife, the wild career of the unmounted manamong them, and Ted and Stella pressing through them from the rear withshouts and cracking quirts.
"Great Scott! They'll get him!" shouted Ted, reining in his pony.
The furious steers had turned their attention to the man on foot, andwere surging about him with angry bellowings, charging upon him, andcrowding him.
He was in a very perilous position, and it was only that the cattle wereherded so close together that he had not gone down sooner.
But once the cattle got him down he would be gored and trampled todeath. Nothing could save him.
Ted and Stella were trying to force their way to his side, but wereunable to do so.
Notwithstanding the fact the fellow had been caught in the act ofmutilating his cattle, Ted could not see him die without trying to savehim.
Now they heard a cry of fear, and saw the man throw his arms up in theair.
The cattle were surging about him with wild and angry bovine cries, andwith a great tossing of horns, and leaps into the air.
There were muffled yells of agony from beneath the tossing mass ofhorns.
"They've got him," muttered Ted. "They are wreaking their own revenge."
"Are they killing him, Ted?" asked Stella.
"They have got him down. The fool he was to go among them on foot. Heshould have known better."
Ted made another effort to get through the cattle, and at last succeededin making a lane for himself.
"Stella," he shouted over his shoulder, "you stay where you are! This isnothing for you to see. Better let me attend to this."
Stella was aware that Ted always knew what he was talking about when hewarned her away from anything, and she made her way out of the herd.
When Ted got to the spot where he had last seen the man, the cattle werestill milling, but were getting calmer, and had no hesitancy inscattering when he rode among them slashing right and left with hisquirt and firing his revolver over their heads.
When he had cleared an open space he rode back into it, and instantlyrecoiled from the sight presented to him.
On the ground lay the hamstringer, a mass of bloody clothes in whichwere torn flesh and broken bones. He was quite dead, and had been notonly gored but had been trampled hundreds of times.
The vengeance of the maimed animals was complete.