The Boy Ranchers Part 16

"Did you get the rustlers, Dad?" asked Bud as he and his cousins, with Dirk and Chot, rode up to the ranch buildings after their successful trip.

"No," answered Mr. Merkel, who was out waiting for his son and the others. "They got clean away."

"Did you see who they were?" asked Dirk.

"Well, I have my suspicions," answered the ranchman. "And I'm not through yet. How'd you make out, boys?"

They told him of the night scare and d.i.c.k's narrow escape, and the eyes of Bud's father glinted in anger.

"Up to tricks like that, are they?" he exclaimed. "Well, I'd like to catch 'em at it!"

"Do you know what I think?" exclaimed Bud with energy.

"Well, son, I can't say I do," spoke his father. "You generally skip around so like a Jack rabbit, it's hard telling where you are. But shoot! What's your trouble?"

"My trouble is," said Bud slowly, "that I don't know enough about those professors and their gang!"

"The professors!" exclaimed Nort and d.i.c.k.

"That's what I said," went on Bud. "I think their pretended search for something is only a bluff. They're high-grade cattle rustlers, that's what I think!"

No one said anything for a few moments, and then Mr. Merkel remarked:

"Well, maybe you're right, Bud. Stranger things have happened. It might pay us to trail these fellows. Certainly there was something queer about them."

"Mighty queer," agreed Bud. "I began to suspect them after they tried to la.s.so d.i.c.k."

"Do you think one of those men--Professor Wright or Professor Blair--tried to snake me off?" asked d.i.c.k.

"Well, no, not one of them, personally," admitted Bud. "They couldn't throw a rope over a mola.s.ses barrel. But they set some one up to it, I'll say!"

"Maybe," spoke Mr. Merkel musingly. "We'll have a look at their trail, if we can pick it up. But we've got a lot else to do first."

Indeed Diamond X ranch was a busy place in those days. d.i.c.k and Nort could not have come at a better time, and they were such apt pupils that they soon acquired many of the ways of the cowboys, who were willing and anxious to teach them. In a comparatively short time the two "tenderfeet" were no longer called that. They could shoot fairly well, though they were not "quick on the draw," and they were becoming more and more expert with the rope every day.

It was about two weeks after their experience with the unknown user of the lariat that Bud and his cousins were sent to ride herd at the Square M ranch, which was one of Mr. Merkel's holdings. He was planning to get a bunch of steers there ready for shipment, and a buyer was to come and look them over when they had been headed in from the open range to a large corral. Bud and his cousins were to help drive the animals in.

Square M ranch, so called because the brand was the letter M in a square, was a good two days' ride from Diamond X. But the boys had a fine time going, and found plenty to do when they arrived. Gradually the cattle were gathered up, and worked toward the corral.

They were within a day's ride of this haven, when, one afternoon, as Bud, d.i.c.k and Nort were moving on ahead of the bunch, which was driven by several cowboys, Bud looked back and let out a yell.

"What's the matter?" cried Nort.

"Stampede!" was the answer, "Oh, boy! Now look out for trouble!"

CHAPTER XV

LOST

Nort and d.i.c.k had heard and read so much about a cattle stampede, and heard such a calamity discussed at the ranch house so often, that they rather welcomed, than otherwise, the announcement that one was being staged near them. This was before they realized the full import of it, and saw the danger.

It was like a prairie fire--they had not realized it could be so terrible and menacing until they actually saw it. And see it they did.

There was needed but a quick backward glance to show that a great fear, or rage, which is almost the same, had entered into the three hundred steers (more or less) that were being driven onward.

At one moment the cattle had been progressing in what might be termed orderly fashion. Now and then a steer would try to break out of the line of march, only to be quickly hazed in again by one of the cowboys, or one of the trio of boy ranchers. But now the whole herd had suddenly been galvanized into action, and that action took the form of running forward at top speed.

It would not have been so bad, perhaps, if the stampede had started from in front. If the forward ranks of cattle had begun to race onward, those behind would simply have followed, and there would gradually have been a slackening up. Of course then there would have been some danger, for the front steers might have slowed down first, while those at the rear still came on, trampling under their sharp hoofs those who were unlucky enough to fall.

But, as it happened, the fright had first seized on the rear bunches of cattle and these had started to run, charging in upon those in front of them, who, in turn, were hurled forward until now, a few seconds after Bud had shouted the alarm, the whole herd was in wild motion.

"Come on!" yelled Bud. "Ride for it! Oh, zowie, boy! Ride for it!

Ride like Zip Foster would!" and with voice, reins and spurs he urged his pony forward.

"What do you aim to do?" shouted d.i.c.k in his cousin's ear as the two thudded along side by side.

"We've got to get far enough ahead so we can try to turn 'em!" yelled Bud. "It's our only chance. Ride straight ahead!"

Nort spurred up alongside of his cousin and brother, and, as he did so he yelled:

"What you s'pose started 'em off, Bud?"

"Haven't any time to do any s'posin' now!" was the grim answer. "Ride on and say your prayers that your pony doesn't step in a prairie dog's hole. If he does--and you fall--good night!"

The recent tenderfeet knew, without being told, what was meant. To go down before a herd of wild cattle, infuriated because they were frightened, would mean sure death and in horrible form.

As Nort looked back, to see what distance lay between himself and comrades, and the foremost of the herd, he saw several figures on horseback at one side of the running animals. At first he imagined these were Diamond X cowboys who had been in the rear of the steers, and he thought they had ridden up to help the boy ranchers turn the stampeded animals. But another look showed him the men who had been in the rear still in those positions, though they were spurring forward at top speed.

"Look, Bud!" cried Nort. He pointed to the four figures--there were no more than that--at the left of the galloping herd.

"Rustlers--Greasers!" shouted Bud. "They started this stampede!"

"What for?" d.i.c.k wanted to know. "They can't hope to run off any under our eyes, can they?"

"They're doing it to get fresh meat!" declared Bud, who never ceased, all this while, to urge his pony forward, an example followed by his cousins with their horses. "They think some steer, or maybe half a dozen, will fall and be trampled to death. Then they'll have all the beef they can eat--for nothing. They started this stampede, or I'll never speak to Zip Foster again."

By this time, knowing Bud as they did, Nort and d.i.c.k had ceased to ask about the mysterious Zip Foster. But Nort could not forego the question:

"How'd they do it?"

"Do what?" grunted Bud, as he skillfully turned his pony away from a prairie dog's hole.

"Start this stampede."

"Hanged if I know. They might have been lying in wait for us to come along--hidden out on the range, and they may have all jumped up with whoops, waving their hats, and setting the steers off that way, when we didn't happen to be looking. But that's where the disturbance came from all right!"