Chapter II
Dave Caches a Gunnysack
Fox rode about ten yards behind his prisoner, who plodded withoutspirit up the creek trail that led from the basin.
"You're certainly an accommodating fellow, Dave," he jeered. "I'veseen them as would have grumbled a heap at digging up that sack, andthen loaning me their horse to carry it whilst they walked. But you'rethat cheerful. My own brother wouldn't have been so kind."
Dingwell grunted sulkily. He may have felt cheerful, but he did notlook it. The pudgy round body of Fox shook with silent laughter.
"Kind is the word, Dave. Honest, I hate to put myself underobligations to you like this. If I hadn't seen with my own eyes howyou was feeling the need of them health exercises, I couldn't let youforce your bronc on me. But this little walk will do you a lot ofgood. It ain't far. My horse is up there in the pines."
"What are you going to do with me?" growled the defeated man over hisshoulder.
"Do with you?" The voice of Fox registered amiable surprise. "Why, Iam going to ask you to go up to the horse ranch with me so that theboys can thank you proper for digging up the gold."
Directly in front of them a spur of the range jutted out to meet thebrown foothills. Back of this, forty miles as the crow flies, nestleda mountain park surrounded by peaks. In it was the Rutherford horseranch. Few men traveled to it, and these by little-used trails. Ofthose who frequented them, some were night riders. They carried aprice on their heads, fugitives from localities where the arm of thelaw reached more surely.
Through the dry brittle grass the man on horseback followed Dingwell tothe scant pines where his cowpony was tethered. Fox dismounted andstood over his captive while the latter transferred the gunnysack andits contents to the other saddle. Never for an instant did the littlespy let the other man close enough to pounce upon him. Even thoughDingwell was cowed, Chet proposed to play it safe. Not till he was inthe saddle himself did he let his prisoner mount.
Instantly Dave's cowpony went into the air.
"Whoa, you Teddy! What's the matter with you?" cried the owner of thehorse angrily. "Quit your two-stepping, can't you?"
The animal had been gentle enough all day, but now a devil of unrestseemed to have entered it. The sound of trampling hoofs thudded on thehard, sun-baked earth as the bronco came down like a pile-driver,camel-backed, with legs stiff and unjointed. Skyward it flung itselfagain, whirled in the air, and jarred down at an angle. Wildly flappedthe arms of the cattleman. The quirt, wrong end to, danced up and downclutched in his flying fist. Each moment it looked as if Mr. Dingwellwould take the dust.
The fat stomach of Fox shook with mirth. "Go it, you buckaroo," heshouted. "You got him pulling leather. Sunfish, you pie-faced cayuse."
The horse in its lunges pounded closer. Fox backed away, momentarilyalarmed. "Here ---- you, hold your brute off. It'll be on top of mein a minute," he screamed.
Apparently Dingwell had lost all control of the bucker. Somehow hestill stuck to the saddle, by luck rather than skill it appeared. Hisarms, working like windmills, went up as Teddy shot into the air again.The hump-backed weaver came down close to the other horse. At the sameinstant Dingwell's loose arm grew rigid and the loaded end of the quirtdropped on the head of Fox.
The body of Fox relaxed and the rifle slid from his nerveless fingers.Teddy stopped bucking as if a spring had been touched. Dingwell was onhis own feet before the other knew what had happened. His long armplucked the little man from the saddle as if he had been a child.
Still jarred by the blow, Fox looked up with a ludicrous expression onhis fat face. His mind was not yet adjusted to what had taken place.
"I told you to keep the brute away," he complained querulously. "Now,see what you've done."
Dave grinned. "Looks like I spilled your apple cart. No, don't botherabout that gun. I'll take care of it for you. Much obliged."
Chet's face registered complex emotion. Incredulity struggled withresentment. "You made that horse buck on purpose," he charged.
"You're certainly a wiz, Chet," drawled the cattleman.
"And that business of being sore at yourself and ashamed was all abluff. You were laying back to trick me," went on Fox venomously.
"How did you guess it? Well, don't you care. We're born to trouble asthe sparks fly upward. As for man, his days are as grass. He diggetha pit and falleth into it his own self. Likewise he digs a hole andburies gold, but beholds another guy finds it. See, Second Ananias,fourteen, twelve."
"That's how you show your gratitude, is it? I might 'a' shot you safeand comfortable from the mesquite and saved a lot of trouble."
"I don't wonder you're disgusted, Chet. But be an optimist. I might'a' busted you high and wide with that quirt instead of giving you anice little easy tap that just did the business. There's no manner ofuse being regretful over past mistakes," Dave told him cheerfully.
"It's easy enough for you to say that," groaned Fox, his hand to anaching head. "But I didn't lambaste you one on the nut. Anyhow,you've won out."
"I had won out all the time, only I hadn't pulled it off yet," Dingwellexplained with a grin. "You didn't think I was going up to the horseranch with you meek and humble, did you? But we can talk while weride. I got to hustle back to Battle Butte and turn in this sack tothe sheriff so as I can claim the reward. Hate to trouble you, Chet,but I'll have to ask you to transfer that gunnysack back to Teddy.He's through bucking for to-day, I shouldn't wonder."
Sourly Fox did as he was told. Then, still under orders, he mountedhis own horse and rode back with his former prisoner to the park.Dingwell gathered up the rifle and revolver that had been left at theedge of the aspen grove and headed the horses for Battle Butte.
"We'll move lively, Chet," he said. "It will be night first thing weknow."
Chet Fox was no fool. He could see how carefully Dingwell had built upthe situation for his coup, and he began at once laying the groundworkfor his own escape. There was in his mind no intention of trying torecover the gold himself, but if he could get away in time to let theRutherfords know the situation, he knew that Dave would have an uneasylife of it.
"'Course I was joking about shooting you up from the mesquite, Dave,"he explained as the horses climbed the trail from the park. "I ain'tgot a thing against you--nothing a-tall. Besides, I'm a law-abidingcitizen. I don't hold with this here gunman business. I never was akiller, and I don't aim to begin now."
"Sure, I know how tender-hearted you are, Chet. I'm that way, too.I'm awful sorry for myself when I get in trouble. That's why I tappedyou on the cocoanut with the end of my quirt. That's why I'd let youhave about three bullets from old Tried and True here right in the backif you tried to make your getaway. But, as you say, I haven't a thingagainst you. I'll promise you one of the nicest funerals WashingtonCounty ever had."
The little man laughed feebly. "You will have your joke, Dave, but Iknow mighty well you wouldn't shoot me. You got no legal right todetain me."
"I'd have to wrastle that out with the coroner afterward, I expect,"replied Dingwell casually. "Not thinking of leaving me, are you?"
"Oh, no! No. Not at all. I was just kinder talking."
It was seven miles from Lonesome Park to Battle Butte. Fox kept up akind of ingratiating whine whenever the road was so rough that thehorses had to fall into a walk. He was not sure whether when it cameto the pinch he could summon nerve to try a bolt, but he laid himselfout to establish friendly relations. Dingwell, reading him like aprimer, cocked a merry eye at the man and grinned.
About a mile from Battle Butte they caught up with another rider, ayoung woman of perhaps twenty. The dark, handsome face that turned tosee who was coming would have been a very attractive one except for itslook of sulky rebellion. From the mop of black hair tendrils hadescaped and brushed the wet cheeks flushed by the sting of the rain.The girl rode splendidly. Even the slicker that she wore could notdisguise the flat back a
nd the erect carriage of the slender body.
Dingwell lifted his hat. "Good-evenin', Miss Rutherford."
She nodded curtly. Her intelligent eyes passed from his to those ofFox. A question and an answer, neither of them in words, flashed forthand back between Beulah Rutherford and the little man.
Dave took a hand in the line-up as they fell into place beside eachother. "Hold on, Fox. You keep to the left of the road. I'll ridenext you with Miss Rutherford on my right." He explained to the girlwith genial mockery his reason. "Chet and I are such _tillicums_ wehate to let any one get between us."
Bluntly the girl spoke out, "What's the matter?"
The cattleman lifted his eyebrows in amused surprise. "Why, nothing atall, I reckon. There's nothing the matter, is there, Chet?"
"I've got an engagement to meet your father and he won't let me go,"blurted out Fox.
"When did you make that hurry-up appointment, Chet?" laughed Dingwell."You didn't seem in no manner of hurry when you was lying in themesquite back there at Lonesome Park."
"You've got no business to keep him here. He can go if he wants to,"flashed the young woman.
"You hear that, Chet. You can go if you want to," murmured Dave withgood-natured irony.
"Said he'd shoot me in the back if I hit the trail any faster," Foxsnorted to the girl.
"He wouldn't dare," flamed Beulah Rutherford.
Her sultry eyes attacked Dingwell.
He smiled, not a whit disturbed. "You see how it is, Chet. Maybe Iwill; maybe I won't. Be a sport and you'll find out."
For a minute the three rode in silence except for the sound of thehorses moving. Beulah did not fully understand the situation, but itwas clear to her that somehow Dingwell was interfering with a plan ofher people. Her untamed youth resented the high-handed way in which heseemed to be doing it. What right had he to hold Chet Fox a prisonerat the point of a rifle?
She asked a question flatly. "Have you got a warrant for Chet'sarrest?"
"Only old Tried and True here." Dave patted the barrel of his weapon.
"You're not a deputy sheriff?"
"No-o. Not officially."
"What has Chet done?"
Dingwell regarded the other man humorously. "What have you done, Chet?You must 'a' broke some ordinance in that long career ofdisrespectability of yours. I reckon we'll put it that you obstructedtraffic at Lonesome Park."
Miss Rutherford said no more. The rain had given way to a gentle mist.Presently she took off her slicker and held it on the left side of thesaddle to fold. The cattleman leaned toward her to lend a hand.
"Lemme roll it up," he said.
"No, I can."
With the same motion the girl had learned in roping cattle she flungthe slicker over his head. Her weight on the left stirrup, she threwher arms about him and drew the oil coat tight.
"Run, Chet!" she cried.
Fox was off like a flash.
Hampered by his rifle, Dave could use only one hand to free himself.The Rutherford girl clung as if her arms had been ropes of steel.Before he had shaken her off, the runaway was a hundred yards down theroad galloping for dear life.
Dave raised his gun. Beulah struck the barrel down with her quirt. Helowered the rifle, turned to her, and smiled. His grin was rueful butfriendly.
"You're a right enterprising young lady for a schoolmarm, but Iwouldn't have shot Chet, anyhow. The circumstances don't warrant it."
She swung from the saddle and picked her coat out of the mud where ithad fallen. Her lithe young figure was supple as that of a boy.
"You've spoiled my coat," she charged resentfully.
The injustice of this tickled him. "I'll buy you a new one when we getto town," he told her promptly.
Her angry dignity gave her another inch of height. "I'll attend tothat, Mr. Dingwell. Suppose you ride on and leave me alone. I won'tdetain you."
"Meaning that she doesn't like your company, Dave," he mused aloud,eyes twinkling. "She seemed kinder fond of you, too, a minute ago."
Almost she stamped her foot. "Will you go? Or shall I?"
"Oh, I'm going, Miss Rutherford. If I wasn't such an aged, decrepitwreck I'd come up and be one of your scholars. Anyhow, I'm real gladto have met you. No, I can't stay longer. So sorry. Good-bye."
He cantered down the road in the same direction Fox had taken. Ithappened that he, too, wanted to be alone, for he had a problem tosolve that would not wait. Fox had galloped in to warn the Rutherfordgang that he had the gold. How long it would take him to round up twoor three of them would depend on chance. Dave knew that they might bewaiting for him before he reached town. He had to get rid of thetreasure between that spot and town, or else he had to turn on histired horse and try to escape to the hills. Into his mind popped apossible solution of the difficulty. It would depend on whether luckwas for or against him. To dismount and hide the sack was impossible,both because Beulah Rutherford was on his heels and because the muddyroad would show tracks where he had stopped. His plan was to hide itwithout leaving the saddle.
He did. At the outskirts of Battle Butte he crossed the bridge overBig Creek and deflected to the left. He swung up one street and downanother beside which ran a small field of alfalfa on one side. Ahundred yards beyond it he met another rider, a man called SlimSanders, who worked for Buck Rutherford as a cow-puncher.
The two men exchanged nods without stopping. Apparently the news thatFox had brought was unknown to the cowboy. But Dingwell knew he was onhis way to the Legal Tender Saloon, which was the hang-out of theRutherford followers. In a few minutes Sanders would get his orders.
Dave rode to the house of Sheriff Sweeney. He learned there that thesheriff was downtown. Dingwell turned toward the business section ofthe town and rode down the main street. From a passer-by he learnedthat Sweeney had gone into the Legal Tender a few minutes before. Infront of that saloon he dismounted.
Fifty yards down the street three men were walking toward him. Herecognized them as Buck Rutherford, Sanders, and Chet Fox. The littleman walked between the other two and told his story excitedly.Dingwell did not wait for them. He had something he wanted to tellSweeney and he passed at once into the saloon.