CHAPTER XXIV
QUESTIONS
“What’s up?” asked Jerry, solicitously. “Someone ill?”
“No,” answered Ned. “But dad intimates that we’ve fallen down on thejob, so to speak, and he thinks we might as well give it up and lethim send on a real detective. He says he knows of one that used to bein the United States Secret Service and he thinks this fellow wouldsucceed where we’ve failed.”
“I don’t admit we’ve failed yet!” Jerry exclaimed. “Of course, I don’twant to presume to dictate to your father,” he hastened to add, “but Iwish he’d give us a little more time.”
“My father says the same thing that Ned’s father does,” said Bob, whohad finished reading his letter. “I guess yours and mine must have hada confab, and decided on this move,” he remarked to Ned.
“It looks that way. But I’m not going home, fellows. I’m going to stickit out!” and Ned struck a defiant attitude.
“So’m I!” exclaimed Bob.
“Rebels!” remarked Jerry with a smile, though none of the lads felt inany gay mood since the disappearance of Professor Snodgrass.
“Well, you have to rebel once in a while,” went on Ned. “I don’t meanto say that I’d deliberately disobey my dad,” he added. “But he doesn’tunderstand. I suppose he’s a bit sore at losing so many cattle, and Idon’t know that I blame him. But he doesn’t understand the situationhere, and your father doesn’t either, Bob.”
“I’m with you there. But this letter says come home without delay, andlet the detective take up the case. Dad says there are certain reasonsfor this.”
“What are they?” asked Jerry.
“Mine mentions ’em, too,” added Ned. “It seems that my father is rathersorry he bought a ranch, and got Mr. Baker to go in on the deal. Dadwants the money he put in it to finance some other matters connectedwith his store, though he doesn’t go into details.
“He says they had a chance to sell the ranch at a handsome profit, butthe intending purchaser backed out when he heard rustlers were runningoff the cattle. The man said he wanted a ranch with some _steers_ onit, not just _grass_,” went on Ned with a rueful smile as he referredto his father’s letter.
“Is the deal off?” asked Jerry. “It’s too bad to have your father losemoney, Ned.”
“Yes. Though dad isn’t poor, still he is a good business man, and itmust get on his nerves to see a waste in finances. The man who wasgoing to buy the place hasn’t exactly given up all interest in it, buthe won’t purchase until the rustlers are captured.”
“Then it’s up to us to get ’em!” cried Jerry. “We must do more and talkless.”
“I’m with you there,” agreed Ned. “But what can we do?”
“Especially when we’re practically ordered home,” put in Bob. “Told togive up and let a real detective take a hand! What can we do?” and helooked at his two chums.
Ned seemed to have a sudden inspiration.
“I know one thing I’m going to do!” he exclaimed.
“What?” cried his two chums together.
“I’m going to telegraph to dad.”
“And say what?” Jerry queried.
“I’m going to wire him that Professor Snodgrass has most unexpectedlydisappeared, and that we can’t leave him here in this predicament,especially as he came out West with us as our guest. That will get mymother, anyhow,” he added with a twinkle in his eyes. “Mother’s greaton that hospitable stuff, and she’ll get dad to let us stay all right.She’ll argue that it would be wrong for us to come away and leave theprofessor in the hands of the rustlers--if that’s where he really is.”
“I think you’re right,” returned Jerry, after a moment of thought.“It’s only fair to him, and it will gain us a little delay in which wemust work harder than ever before to solve the mystery.”
“Now you’re talking!” cried Bob.
This telegram was prepared and sent to Mr. Slade:
“Professor Snodgrass has disappeared. Probably captured by rustlers. Are on their trail. Impossible to leave now. Better wire us money for expenses. Letter follows.”
“Think that will do?” asked Ned.
“Pretty well gotten up,” Jerry assented. “You put it a bit strong,though, about being on their trail.”
“Well, it’s true enough. We are after them--on their trail--so tospeak. I didn’t say we had _caught_ them. But we will!”
“I hope so!” agreed Jerry.
The boys anxiously awaited the reply to their message, and to theirgratification, it came the next day. They were told they might remain,and in a letter that followed a few days later funds were sent toall three, while there were many expressions of concern from those inCresville concerning the fate of Professor Snodgrass.
“Spare no expense in finding him,” wrote Mr. Slade. “Hire a couple ofdetectives if necessary.”
“I guess we can do as well at this business as the city detectives,”growled Ned.
His chums agreed with him.
“And we haven’t got to the bottom of the mystery of Munson’s fakeleg,” remarked Jerry as, on the afternoon following the receipt of theletters, they were riding together toward a distant part of the ranch.
“No, that’s another secret we have to solve,” agreed Ned. “He saidsomething about riding to town to-day to have the doctor look at it.He’s limping worse than ever.”
“He’ll never do it,” observed Bob.
“Do what?” asked Jerry.
“Let a doctor examine his leg. That would give the fake away right offthe bat. That’s why he didn’t want to let the doctor look the time youwere hurt, Jerry.”
“Oh, of course! But, it sure is a queer game.”
The capture of Professor Snodgrass--if capture it was--seemed to puta quietus on the cattle raids. The stock at Square Z ranch had notbeen molested since his capture, and the foreman and his cowboys werebeginning to feel that perhaps the operating gang had been frightenedoff because of the vigorous search made for them.
Meanwhile, Professor Snodgrass had not been forgotten. A systematicsearch was kept up for him, but without result. Circulars describinghim had been sent through the mail to various ranches and to theneighboring cities. Cowboys from other ranges made trips to themountain where he had last been seen and tried to find the littlescientist. But he seemed to have disappeared completely. Ned, Bob andJerry joined in these hunts, eagerly searching for some clue to themystery.
Reports from distant ranches told that there had not been any cattlelosses on them of late, though no other ranch had ever been sosystematically robbed as had Square Z.
And then, like a thunderclap on a pleasant day, came a change. Twocowboys, who had been sent to bring in a bunch of choice steers forshipment to Omaha, returned without them but with worried faces.
“Well?” asked the foreman. “Where are they?”
“Gone.”
“Rustlers?”
“Yep.”
“Huh!”
It was short talk but to the point.
“How did it happen?” Mr. Watson demanded, and when the cowboy admittedthat the raid took place while he and his companion slept, the foremanbecame angry for one of the few times the boys had seen him in thatcondition.
“Get off the ranch! You’re discharged!” he called to the cowboys. “Atenderfoot could have done better!”
There was more than the usual buzz of excitement about the ranch whenthe news of the cattle raid became known. It proved, at least to Ned,Bob and Jerry, that the rustlers were still in the neighborhood and ifthey were, and had captured the professor, there was a chance to rescuehim.
“Your father will feel still more greatly disappointed in us when hehears there’s been another raid,” said Jerry to Ned.
“I don’t intend he shall hear of it right away,” was the answer; andwhen Jerry pressed for an explanation his chum said he was going to askthe foreman not to telegraph word of the theft to Mr. Slade for a fewdays.
“I want to have an opportunity to see what we can do,” went on Ned. “Itmay be our last chance. A few days’ delay in letting dad know won’tdo him any harm, and it will allow us to keep on trying to solve themystery. If we can’t, in a reasonable time, I’m willing to quit, andlet the New York detective try his hand.”
“Well, maybe it will be wise,” agreed Jerry. “But we’ll put in our bestlicks on this last chance. It does seem as though we ought to get somesort of clue to the thieves after all these tries.”
As the cowboys who had reported the raid did not know what time it tookplace, except at some hour during the night, it could not be said howmuch of a start the thieves had. It was seven hours at least, for themen had reached the ranch house about noon, and they had awakened atdaylight to find the cattle gone. More likely it was ten hours, andthat was a good start.
The trail of the stolen cattle was comparatively easy to follow. And,as had the others, eventually it led to the foot hills and to theravine the boys had explored so ineffectually.
“The secret is here, and here’s where we’ve got to stick until we findit!” declared Jerry. “We’ll make a secret camp here, and not leave dayor night. Can’t you plant a bunch of cattle somewhere, so they could beeasily stolen?” he asked Mr. Watson.
“I s’pose I could. But why?”
“Well, we could stay near ’em and see who takes ’em. Then we couldfollow.”
“Oh, a sort of trap, eh?”
“That’s it.”
“Well, I’ll think about it.”
Search as they did, the rest of that day, no trace of the missingcattle could be found. They returned to the ranch, tired anddespondent. Mr. Watson had agreed to wait a few days before informingMr. Slade of this latest loss.
“I’ll give you your last chance, boys,” he said. “Make the most of it.”
That night, when the three chums were out among the cowboys, listeningto their talk, Munson came in. Hinkee Dee seemed to notice him at once.
“Where you been all day?” asked the assistant foreman.
“In town, having my leg treated.”
“Do any treating on your own account?”
“Why, no, I can’t say I did.”
“Oh, you weren’t around Jack’s place then?”
Munson looked up quickly at this persistent questioning.
“I don’t see that it is any of your business if I was,” he said slowly.
A flush mounted to the tanned face of Hinkee Dee.