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The Trail of The Badger: A Story of the Colorado Border Thirty Years Ago

by Sidford F. Hamp · English · Gutenberg #43989 · 397,995 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Trail of The Badger: A Story of the Colorado Border Thirty Years Ago

Author: Sidford F. Hamp

Illustrator: Chase Emerson


        
Release date: October 21, 2013 [eBook #43989]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TRAIL OF THE BADGER: A STORY OF THE COLORADO BORDER THIRTY YEARS AGO ***

THE TRAIL OF THE BADGER

[Illustration: "DICK PUSHED HIS RIFLE-BARREL THROUGH A CREVICE IN THE
ROCKS."]




The Trail of The Badger

_A STORY OF THE COLORADO BORDER THIRTY YEARS AGO_

BY
SIDFORD F. HAMP

_Author of "Dale and Fraser, Sheepmen,"
"The Boys of Crawford's Basin," etc._


ILLUSTRATED BY
CHASE EMERSON

[Illustration: logo]

W. A. WILDE COMPANY
BOSTON      CHICAGO


_Copyrighted, 1908_ BY W. A. WILDE COMPANY _All rights reserved_




THE TRAIL OF THE BADGER




PREFACE


In writing the adventures of the boys who followed "The Trail of the
Badger" down into that part of Colorado where the fringes of two
discordant civilizations overlapped each other--the strenuous
Anglo-Saxon and the easygoing Mexican--the author has endeavored to show
how two healthy, enterprising young fellows were able to do their little
part in that great work of Desert Reclamation whose importance is now as
well understood by the general public as it always has been by those
whose lot has been cast to the west of meridian one hundred and five.

To some it may appear that the boys are ahead of their time, but to the
author, whose introduction to "the arid region" dates back thirty years
and more, remembering the conditions then prevailing, it seems no more
than natural that they should recognize the unusual opportunity
presented to them of making a career for themselves, and even that they
should be dimly conscious of the fact that if they "could make two ears
of corn, or two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot of ground where
only one grew before" they would be deserving well of the infant
community of which they formed a part.

That in making this attempt they would meet with adventures--in fact,
that they could hardly avoid them--the author, recalling his own
experiences in that country at that time, feels well assured.




CONTENTS


    I. DICK STANLEY                     11

   II. SHEEP AND CINNAMON               32

  III. THE MESCALERO VALLEY             51

   IV. RACING THE STORM                 68

    V. HOW DICK BROUGHT THE NEWS        87

   VI. THE PROFESSOR'S STORY           102

  VII. DICK'S DIPLOMACY                116

 VIII. THE START                       129

   IX. ANTONIO MARTINEZ                147

    X. THE PADRON                      165

   XI. THE SPANISH TRAIL               179

  XII. THE BADGER                      191

 XIII. THE KING PHILIP MINE            203

  XIV. A CHANGE OF PLAN                221

   XV. DICK'S SNAP SHOT                241

  XVI. THE OLD PUEBLO HEAD-GATE        259

 XVII. THE BRIDGE                      276

XVIII. THE BIG FLUME                   294

  XIX. PEDRO'S BOLD STROKE             313

   XX. THE MEMORABLE TWENTY-NINTH      333




ILLUSTRATIONS


"Dick pushed his rifle-barrel through a crevice in
the rocks"                     (_Frontispiece_)          42

"It was a splendid chance; nobody could ask for a
better target"                                           57

"Passing on our way through the town of Mosby"          137

"Behind him, stood the squat figure of Pedro Sanchez"   213

"I could not think what he was doing it for"            286




The Trail of the Badger




CHAPTER I

DICK STANLEY


"Look out! Look out! Behind you, man! Behind you! Jump quick, or he'll
get you!"

It was a boy, a tall, spare, wiry young fellow of sixteen, who shouted
this warning, his voice, in its frantic urgency, rising almost to a
shriek at the end; and it was another boy, also tall, spare and wiry, to
whom the warning was shouted. The latter turned to look behind him, and
for one brief instant his whole body stiffened with fear--his very hair
stood on end. Nor is this a mere figure of speech: the boy's hair did
actually stand on end: he could feel it "creep" against the crown of his
hat. _I know_--for I was the boy!

That I had good reason to be "scared stiff" I think any other boy will
admit, for, not thirty feet below me, coming quickly and silently up
the rocks, his little gleaming eyes fixed intently upon me, was a grim
old cinnamon bear, an animal which, though less dangerous than his big
cousin, the grizzly, is quite dangerous enough when he is thoroughly in
earnest.

But for my companion's warning shout the bear would surely have caught
me, and my story would have come to an end at the very beginning of the
first chapter.

It was certainly an awkward situation, about as awkward, I should think,
as any boy ever got himself into; and how I, Frank Preston, lately a
schoolboy in St. Louis, happened to find myself on a spur of Mescalero
Mountain, in Colorado, with a cinnamon bear charging up the rocks within
a few feet of me, needs a word of explanation.

I will therefore go back a few steps in order to give myself space for a
preliminary run before jumping head-first into my story, and will tell
not only how I came to be there, but will relate also the curious
incident which first brought me into contact with my future friend, Dick
Stanley; an incident which, while it served as an introduction, at the
same time gave me some idea of the resourcefulness and promptness of
action with which his very peculiar training had endowed him.

It was in the last week of October, 1877, that I was seated one evening
in my room in St. Louis, very busy preparing my studies for next day,
when the door opened suddenly and in walked my Uncle Tom.

When, at the age of seven, I had been left an orphan, Uncle Tom, my
mother's brother, though himself a bachelor, had taken charge of me, and
with him I had lived ever since. He and I, I am glad to say, were the
best of friends--regular chums--for, though twenty years my senior, he
seemed in some respects to be as young as myself, and our relations were
more like those of elder and younger brother than of uncle and nephew.

Uncle Tom was rather short and rather fat, and he was moreover one of
the jolliest of men, being blessed with a disposition which prompted him
always to see the bright side of things, no matter how dark and
threatening they might look. Having at a very early age been pitched out
into the world to "fend for himself," and having by square dealing and
hard work done remarkably well, he had imbibed the idea that
book-learning as a means of getting on in the world was somewhat
overrated; an idea which, right or wrong--and I think myself that Uncle
Tom carried it rather too far--was to have a decided effect in shaping
my own career.

As it was against the rule, laid down by Uncle Tom himself, for any one
to disturb me at my studies, I naturally looked up from my books to
ascertain the cause of the intrusion, when, with a cigar in his mouth
and his hands in his pockets, he came bulging in, half filling the
little room.

That there was something unusual in the wind I felt sure, and my
guardian's first act went far to confirm my suspicion, for, removing one
hand from his pocket, he quietly reached forward and with his finger
tilted my book shut.

"Put 'em away," said he. "You won't need them for a month or more."

As the fall term of school was then in full swing, this declaration was
a good deal of a surprise to me, as any one will suppose, and doubtless
I showed as much in my face.

"I have a scheme in my head, Frank," said he, with a knowing wag of that
member, in reply to my look of inquiry.

"I know _that_," I replied, laughing; for there never was a moment when
Uncle Tom had not a scheme in his head of one sort or another.

"You spider-legged young reptile!" cried he, with perfect good humor,
but at the same time shaking a threatening finger at me. "Don't you dare
to laugh at my schemes; especially this one. For this is a brand-new
idea, and a very important one--to you. I'm leaving to-morrow night for
Colorado."

"Are you?" I cried, a good deal surprised by this sudden announcement.
"When did you decide upon that?"

"To-day. I got a letter this afternoon from my friend, Sam Warren, the
assayer, written from Mosby--if you know where that is."

I shook my head.

"I didn't suppose you did," remarked Uncle Tom. "It is a new mining camp
on one of the spurs of Mescalero Mountain in Colorado, and in the
opinion of Sam Warren--my old schoolmate, you know--it has a great
future before it. So he has written me that if I have the time to spare
I had better come out and take a look at it."

Uncle Tom's business was that of a mining promoter, the middle man
between the prospector and the capitalist, a business in which his
ability and his honorable methods had gained for him an enviable
reputation.

"So you have decided to go out, have you?" said I.

"Yes," he replied. "I leave to-morrow evening--and you are coming with
me."

As may be imagined, I opened my eyes pretty widely at this unfolding of
the "brand-new idea."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Look here, Frank, old chap," said he, seating himself on the edge of
the table and becoming confidential. "You've stuck to your books very
well--if anything, too well. Now, I've had my eye on you ever since the
hot weather last summer, and it strikes me you need a change--you are
too pale and altogether too thin."

Being fat and "comfortable" himself, Uncle Tom was disposed to regard
with pity any one, like myself, whose framework showed through its
covering.

"But----" I began; when Uncle Tom headed me off.

"Now you be quiet," said he, "and let me finish. I've had some such idea
brewing in my head for some time; it isn't a sudden freak, as you
imagine. I've considered the matter carefully, and I've come to the
conclusion that you'll lose nothing by the move. In fact, what you will
lose by missing a month or so of schooling will be more than made up to
you by the eye-opener you will get in making this expedition."

"How so?" I asked.

"You will make the acquaintance of a young State just learning to walk
alone--for, as you know, it was only last year that Colorado came into
the Union; you will see a new mining camp, and rub up against the men,
good, bad and indifferent, who go to make up the community of a frontier
town; and more than that, you will get at first hand, what you never
could get by sitting here and reading about it, a correct idea of the
country traversed by the explorers--Pike, Frémont and the rest of them.

"I am honestly of opinion, Frank," he went on, seriously, "that this is
an opportunity not to be neglected. At the same time, old fellow, as it
is your education and not mine that is under discussion, I consider that
you have a right to a voice in the matter; so I'll leave you to think it
over, and to-morrow at breakfast you can tell me whether you are coming
or not."

With that, Uncle Tom slipped down from the table, walked out and shut
the door behind him. That was his way: he was always as sudden as a clap
of thunder.

Anybody will guess that my books did not receive much more attention
that evening. For an hour I paced up and down the room, considering
Uncle Tom's proposition. It was true that I did feel pulled down by the
effects of the hot weather, combined with a pretty close application to
my books, and I had no doubt that the expedition proposed would do me a
world of good; though whether my education would be benefited in like
manner I was not so sure as Uncle Tom seemed to be.

But though I did my best honestly to consider the question in all its
aspects, there can be little doubt that my inclinations--whether I was
aware of it or not--colored my judgment, so that my final decision was
just what might have been expected in any active boy of sixteen. As the
clock struck ten I ran down-stairs and informed Uncle Tom that I was
going with him.

It is not necessary to go into all the details of our journey, though to
me, who had never before been a hundred miles from home, everything was
new and everything was interesting. It is enough to say that, leaving
the train at the foot of the mountains--for the railroad then went no
further--we engaged places in the mail-carrier's open buckboard, and
after a very rough and very tiring drive of a day and a half we at last
reached our destination and were set down at the door of a house outside
which hung a "shingle" bearing the legend, "Samuel Warren, Assayer and
U. S. Dep. Min. Surveyor."

It will be remembered that one of Uncle Tom's reasons for breaking into
my school term was that I should rub up against the citizens comprising
a frontier settlement. He could hardly have contemplated, however, that
I should come in contact with quite so many of them quite so early in
the day as I did.

We had hardly sat down to the refreshments spread before us by our
host--a big, bearded man, clad in a suit of brown canvas--when we, in
common with the rest of the community, were startled by the sudden
shriek of a woman in distress. To rush to the door was the work of a
moment, when, the first thing we caught sight of was a man, clad only in
his nightshirt, running like a madman up the street, while far behind
him, and losing ground at every step, ran a woman, calling out with all
the breath she had to spare--which was not much--"Stop him! Stop him!"

"It's Tim Donovan!" shouted the assayer. "He's sick with the
mountain-fever! He's crazy! Head him off! Head him off! The poor chap
will die of exposure!"

Warren's house was near the upper end of the street, and just as we
three jumped down the porch steps, the demented fugitive passed the
door, going like the wind. At once we set off in pursuit, while behind
us came all the rest of the population and most of the dogs, by this
time roused to action by the cries of the sick man's wife.

Nobody knows until he has tried it how hard it is to run up-hill at an
elevation of nine thousand feet, especially to one unaccustomed to such
altitudes. Uncle Tom, who was not built for such exercise, fell out in
the first fifty yards, while, of the others, the short-winded barroom
loafers--of whom, as is always the case in a new camp, there were more
than enough--gave out even more quickly, their habits of life being a
fatal handicap in a foot-race. One by one, nearly all the rest came down
to a walk, until presently the only ones left with any run in them were
Jake Peters and Oscar Swansen, both timber-cutters from the hills,
Aleck Smith, a wiry little teamster, and myself.

As for me, having the advantage of a good start over everybody else,
being only sixteen years old, and having a reputation at school as a
long-distance runner, it seemed as though I ought to be able to catch
the unfortunate fugitive, who, having run a quarter of a mile already,
should by this time be out of breath.

Indeed, I believe I should have caught him at the first dash had he not
resorted to tactics which made me chary of coming near him. Not more
than thirty yards separated us and I was gaining steadily, when he,
barefooted himself and making no noise, hearing the clatter of my shoes
behind him, suddenly stopped, picked up a stone and hurled it at me. It
would have taken me square in the chest had I not jumped aside; when,
finding that the man was really dangerous, and knowing very well that I
should have no chance whatever in a personal struggle with him--for he
was a stout young Irish miner with a fore-arm like a leg of mutton--I
contented myself with trotting behind and keeping him in sight; trusting
to the able-bodied men following me to do the tackling when the
opportunity should arise.

The town of Mosby consisted of one steep street about half a mile long
and two houses thick; for it was situated in a valley, or, rather, in a
gorge, so narrow that there was no room for it to spread except at the
two ends. In truth, there was no room for it to grow except southward,
for at the upper, or northern, end the mountains came together, forming
an inaccessible cañon through which rushed the little stream of ice-cold
water coming down from Mescalero.

From the lower end of this cañon the stream fell perpendicularly into a
great hole in the rocks--a sort of natural chimney, or well, about sixty
feet deep. The down-stream side of this "chimney" was split from top to
bottom, and through the narrow crack, only four or five feet wide, the
water leaped foaming down in a series of miniature cascades. The only
way of getting into this deep pit was by taking to the water, scrambling
up the steep, step-like bed of the stream and passing through the crack,
when, once inside, a man might defy the world to come and get him out.

This was exactly what Tim Donovan did. Seeing that he could follow the
stream no further, I was wondering whether he would take to the
mountain on the right or the one on the left, when he suddenly jumped
into the water, ran up the smooth, wet "steps," and disappeared from
sight through the crevice. In ten seconds, however, he showed himself
again. He had found in the driftwood a ragged branch of a pine tree
about three feet long, and with this in one hand and a ten-pound stone
in the other he stood at bay, regardless of the icy water which poured
over his feet, or of the spray from the fall behind him, which in half a
minute had wet his thin single garment through and through.

It was an impregnable stronghold. No one could get in from the rear, and
the place could not be rushed from the front--the ascent was too steep
and slippery and the entrance too narrow. If Tim were determined to stay
there and perish with cold, it appeared to me that nobody could do
anything to prevent him.

One by one the pursuers joined me before the entrance, when Mrs.
Donovan, who was among the last to arrive, advanced as near as she could
without getting into the water, and besought her errant husband to come
down.

But Tim was deaf to entreaty; all the blandishments of his anxious wife
were without effect, and if she could not get him to come down it
appeared as though nobody could.

Tim, though, was a popular young fellow, and it was not in the nature of
a Colorado miner, or of an Irishman either--for they hold together like
burrs in a horse's tail--to desert a comrade in distress. So, Mrs.
Donovan having failed, there stepped to the front a short, thick-set,
red-haired man, Mike O'Brien by name, Tim's partner and particular
crony, who, talking pleasantly and naturally to him, as though his
friend were quite sane and rational, stepped into the water and waded
carefully up the steep slope.

"How are ye, Tim, me boy?" said he, with off-hand cordiality. "It's glad
I am to see ye out again. It's me birthday to-day, Tim; I'm having a bit
of a supper at home an' I come up to ask ye----"

Whack! came the stone from Tim's hand, breaking to pieces against the
rocky wall within an inch of Mike's head. The invitation was declined.

Mike himself, in his effort to dodge the missile, missed his footing,
fell on his back, and in a series of dislocating bumps was swept down
the "steps" to the starting place, wet, as he declared, right through to
his bones.

Up to this time the demented man had kept silence, but on seeing Mike
go tumbling down-stream, he shook his fist after him and cried out:

"Come back and try again, ye devouring baste! Come on, the whole pack of
yez! Don't stand there howling, ye cowardly curs; come up and get me
out--if ye dare!"

"I believe he thinks we are a pack of wolves," said Mr. Warren.

"That's it, Mr. Warren, sir," exclaimed Mrs. Donovan, turning to the
assayer. "That's it, entirely. He heard a wolf howl last night, and it
was hard wor-rk I had to kape him from jumping out of his bed and
running off right thin. He thinks it's a pack of them that's hunting
him."

"Poor fellow! No wonder he refuses to come down. What are we going to
do? We _must_ get him out."

Then ensued an eager debate, in which everybody took a share except
Uncle Tom and myself, who, standing a little apart from the rest on the
sloping bank of the stream, were listening and looking on, when some one
touched me on my arm, and a boyish voice said:

"What's the matter? What's it all about?"

Turning round, I saw before me a tall young fellow about my own age,
with reddish hair, very keen gray eyes and a much-freckled face,
carrying in one hand an old-fashioned, muzzle-loading rifle, nearly as
long as himself, and in the other three grouse which he appeared to have
shot.

Wondering who the boy might be, I explained the situation, when he
cried:

"What! Tim Donovan! Why he'll die if he's left in there. Poor chap! We
must get him out."

"Yes," said Uncle Tom. "That's just it. But how? The man won't be
persuaded to come out, and no one can get in to drag him out--so what's
to be done?"

The young fellow stood for a minute thinking, and then, suddenly lifting
his head, he exclaimed, with a half laugh:

"I know! I know what we can do! He can't be persuaded out or dragged
out, but he can be driven out."

"How?" asked Uncle Tom.

"If you'll come with me," replied the boy, "I'll show you in two
minutes."

So saying, he jumped across the creek and set off straight up the almost
perpendicular side of the mountain, we two following. Uncle Tom,
however, finding the climb too steep for him, very soon turned back
again, so we two boys went on alone.

About three hundred feet up my companion stopped, and it was well for me
he did, for I could hardly have gone another step, so desperately out of
breath was I.

"Not used to it, are you?" said the boy, who himself seemed to be quite
unaffected. "Well, we don't have to go any higher, fortunately. Look
over there. Do you see that stubby pine tree growing out of the rocks
and overhanging the waterfall?"

"Yes, I see it," I replied. "And what's that big round thing hanging to
it?"

"A wasps' nest."

"A wasps' nest?"

"A wasps' nest," repeated my new acquaintance with peculiar emphasis and
with a twinkle in his eye.

"Ah!" I exclaimed, suddenly enlightened. "I see your little game. Good!
You propose to knock down the wasps' nest into the 'well,' and then poor
Tim will just have to vacate."

"That's my idea."

"Great idea, too. But, look here! Are the wasps alive at this time of
year?"

"They are this year. We've had such a wonderfully warm season that they
are just as brisk as ever."

"Well, but there's another thing: how are you going to do it? You can't
get at it: the rocks are too straight-up-and-down; and you can't come
near enough to knock it off with a stone. How are you going to do it?"

The young fellow smiled and patted the stock of his gun.

"Shoot it down!" I exclaimed. "Do you think you can? It won't be any use
plugging it full of holes, you know; you'll have to nip off the little
twig it hangs on. Can you do that?"

"I think I can."

"All right, then, fire away and let's see."

I must confess I felt doubtful. The boy did not look nor talk like a
braggart, but nevertheless, to cut with a bullet the slim little branch,
no bigger than a lead-pencil, upon which the nest hung suspended looked
to me like a pretty ticklish shot.

My companion, however, seemed confident. Cocking his gun, he kneeled
down, and using a big rock as a rest he took careful aim and fired.

It was a perfect shot. The big ball of gray "paper" dropped like a
plumb, struck the rim of the "well," burst open, and emptied upon the
head of the unfortunate Tim about a bucketful of venomous little
yellow-jackets, each and every one of them quivering with rage, and each
and every one bent on taking vengeance on somebody.

The people below were still debating how to get the sick man out of his
fortress, when the sound of the rifle-shot caused them all to look up;
but only for an instant, for the echoes had not yet died away, when,
with a startling yell, out came Tim, frantically waving his club above
his head, seemingly more crazy than ever. Supposing that he was making a
dash for liberty, half a dozen of his particular friends flung
themselves upon him, and down they all went in a heap together.

But this arrangement was of the briefest. In another moment, with
shrieks and yells and whirling arms, the whole population went charging
down the street, Uncle Tom in the lead, running--breath or no breath--as
he had never run before.

Never was there a more complete victory: besiegers and besieged flying
in one general rout before the assaults of the new enemy. And never did
I laugh so extravagantly as I did then, to see the enraged
yellow-jackets "take it out" on an unoffending community, while the real
culprits were all the time sitting safely perched on the mountainside
looking down on the rumpus.

"Well, we got him out all right," remarked my companion, as he calmly
reloaded his rifle. "I thought we could. You're a newcomer, aren't you?
My name's Dick Stanley; I live up-stream, just at the head of the cañon.
Are you expecting to make a long stay?"

"Two or three weeks, I think," I replied. "My uncle, Mr. Tom Allen, is
here to inspect the mines, and he brought me with him. We come from St.
Louis. My name's Frank Preston. We're staying at Mr. Warren's house."

"Well, come up to our house some day. It is in a little clearing just at
the head of the cañon--you can't miss it--and we'll go off for a day's
grouse-shooting up into the mountains if you like."

"All right, I will. That would just suit me. To-morrow?"

"Yes, come up to-morrow, if you like. I'll be on the lookout for you. I
suppose you are going home now," he continued, as we rose to our feet.
"If I were you, I'd keep up here on the side of the mountain--the street
will be full of yellow-jackets--and then, when you come opposite the
assayer's house, make a bolt for his back door, or some of them may get
you yet."

"That's a good idea. I'll do it. Well, good-bye. I'll come up to-morrow
then, if I can."




CHAPTER II

SHEEP AND CINNAMON


"That was the funniest thing I ever saw," exclaimed Uncle Tom, laughing
in spite of himself, while at the same time, with a comically rueful
twist of his countenance, he rubbed the back of his neck where one of
the wasps had "got" him. "The way poor Tim bolted out of his stronghold
after defying the whole population to come and get him out, was the very
funniest thing I ever did see. That was a smart trick of that young
rascal; though I wish he had given me notice beforehand of what he
intended to do. I'd have started to run a good five minutes earlier if
I'd known what was coming. Who is the boy, Warren?"

"Well, that is not easy to say," replied our host, "for, as a matter of
fact, he does not know himself. His history, what there is of it, is a
peculiar one. He lives up here at the head of the cañon with an old
German named Bergen--commonly known as the Professor--and his Mexican
servant, a man of forty whom the professor brought up with him from
Albuquerque, I believe. If Frank's object in coming here was to rub up
against all sorts and conditions of men, he could hardly have chosen a
better place. Certainly he cannot expect to find a more remarkable
character than the professor.

"The old fellow is regarded by the people here as a harmless
lunatic--which, in a community like this, where muscle is at a premium
and scientific attainments at a discount, is not to be wondered at--for
it is incomprehensible to them that any man in his right mind should
spend his life as the professor spends his.

"The old gentleman is an enthusiastic naturalist. He is making a
collection of the butterflies, beetles and such things, of the Rocky
Mountain region, and with true German thoroughness he has spent years in
the pursuit. Choosing some promising spot, he builds a log cabin, and
there he stays one year--or two if necessary--until that district is
'fished out,' as you may say, when he packs up and moves somewhere else,
to do the same thing over again."

"Well, that is certainly a queer character to come across," was Uncle
Tom's comment. "But how about the boy, Sam? How does he happen to be in
such company?"

"Why, about twelve or thirteen years ago, old Bergen was 'doing' the
country somewhere northwest of Santa Fé, when he made a very strange
discovery. It was a bad piece of country for snowslides, which were
frequent and dangerous in the spring, and one day, being anxious to get
to a particular point quickly, the professor was crossing the tail of a
new slide--a risky thing to do--as being the shortest cut, when his
attention was attracted by some strange object lodged half way up the
great bank of snow. Climbing up to it, he found to his astonishment that
the strange object was a wagon-bed, while, to his infinitely greater
astonishment, inside it on a mattress, fast asleep, was a three-year-old
boy--young Dick!"

"That was an astonisher, sure enough!" exclaimed I, who had been an
eager listener. "And was that all the professor found?"

"That was all. The running-gear of the wagon had vanished; the horses
had vanished; and the boy's parents or guardians had vanished--all
buried, undoubtedly, under the snow."

"And what did the professor do?"

"The only thing he could do: took the boy with him--and a fortunate
thing it was for young Dick that the old gentleman happened to find
him. But though he inquired of everybody he came across--they were not
many, for white folks were scarce in those parts then--the professor
could learn nothing of the party; so, not knowing what else to do, he
just carried off the youngster with him, and with him Dick has been ever
since."

"That's a queer history, sure enough," remarked Uncle Tom. "And was
there nothing at all by which to identify the boy?"

"Just one thing. I forgot to say that in the wagon-bed was a single
volume of Shakespeare--one of a set: volume two--on the fly-leaf of
which was written the name, 'Richard Livingstone Stanley, from Anna,'
and as the boy was old enough to tell his own name--Dick Stanley--the
professor concluded that the owner of the book was his father. Moreover,
as the boy made no mention of his mother, though he now and then spoke
of his 'Daddy' and his 'Uncle David,' the old gentleman formed the
theory that the mother was dead and that the father and uncle, bringing
the boy with them, had come west to seek their fortunes, and being very
likely tenderfeet, unacquainted with the dangerous nature of those great
snow-masses in spring time, they had been caught in a slide and
killed."

"Poor little chap," said Uncle Tom. "And he has been wandering about
with the old gentleman ever since, has he? He must be a sort of Wild Man
of the West in miniature."

"Not a bit of it. The professor is a man of learning, and he has not
neglected his duty. Dick has a highly respectable education, including
some items rather out of the common for a boy: he speaks German and
Spanish; he has a pretty intimate knowledge of the wild animals of the
Rocky Mountains; and he is one of the best woodsmen and quite the best
shot of anybody in these immediate parts."

"Well, they are an odd pair, certainly. I should like to go up and see
the professor--that is, if he ever receives visitors."

"Oh, yes. He's a sociable old fellow. He and I are very good friends.
I'll take you up there and introduce you some day. He is well worth
knowing. If there is any information you desire concerning the Rocky
Mountain country from here southward to the border, Herr Bergen can give
it you. You are to be congratulated, Frank, on making Dick's
acquaintance so early: he will be a fine companion for you while you
stay here. You propose to go grouse-shooting to-morrow, do you? Well,
you can take my shotgun--it hangs up there on the wall--and make a day
of it; for your uncle and I are proposing to ride up to inspect a mine
on Cape Horn, which will take us pretty well all afternoon."

I thanked our host for his offer, and next morning, gun in hand, I set
off immediately after breakfast for Dick's dwelling.

Passing the "well" where Tim Donovan had taken refuge the day before, I
ascended by a clearly-marked trail to the edge of the cañon, and
following along it through the woods for about a mile, I presently came
in sight of a little clearing, in which stood a neat log cabin of two or
three rooms. Outside was a Mexican, chopping wood, while in the doorway
stood Dick, evidently looking out for me, for, the moment I appeared, he
ran forward to meet me.

"How are you?" he cried. "Glad you came early: I have a new plan for the
day, if it suits you. I've been spying around with a field-glass and
I've just seen a band of sheep up on that big middle spur of Mescalero;
they are working their way up from their feeding-ground, and I propose
that we go after them instead of hunting grouse. What do you say?"

"All right; that will suit me."

"Come on, then. Just come into the house for a minute first and see the
professor, and then we'll dig out at once."

From the fact that Mr. Warren had so frequently spoken of the professor
as "the old gentleman," I was prepared to see a bent old man, with a
white beard and big round spectacles--the typical "German professor," of
my imagination. I was a good deal surprised, then, to find a small,
active man of sixty, perhaps, a little gray, certainly, but with a clear
blue eye and a wide-awake manner I was far from anticipating. He was in
the inner room when I entered--evidently the sanctum where he prepared
and stored his specimens--but the moment he heard our steps he came
briskly out, and, on Dick's introducing me, shook hands with me very
heartily.

"And how's poor Tim this morning?" he asked, as soon as the formalities,
if they can be called so, were over.

"He is all right, sir," I replied. "I went down there before breakfast
this morning at Mr. Warren's request to inquire. In fact, Tim was so
much better apparently that Mrs. Donovan declares that if he ever gets
the fever again she intends to apply iced water to his feet and
wasp-stings to the rest of his anatomy, as being a sure cure. She is
immensely grateful to Dick for having discovered and applied a remedy
that has worked so well."

"Then if Tim is wise," remarked the professor, laughing, "he won't get
the fever again, for I should think the cure would be worse than the
disease. But you want to be off, don't you? Do you understand the
working of a Winchester repeater? Well," as I shook my head, "then you
had better take the Sharp's and Dick the Winchester. And, Dick, you'd
better have an eye on the weather. Romero says there is a change coming,
and he is generally pretty reliable. So, now, off you go; and good luck
to you."

Leaving the cabin, we went straight on up the narrow valley for about
three miles--the pine-clad mountains rising half a mile high on either
side of us--going as quickly as we could, or, to be more exact, going as
quickly as I could. For the elevation, beginning at nine thousand feet,
increased, of course, at every step, and I, being unused to such
altitudes, found myself much distressed for breath--a fact which was
rather a surprise to me, considering that in our track-meets at school
the mile run was my strong point. I did not understand then that to get
enough oxygen out of that thin mountain air it was necessary to take two
breaths where one would suffice at sea-level.

We had ascended about a thousand feet, I think, when, at the base of the
bare ridge for which we had been making, we slackened our pace, and my
companion, who knew the country, taking the lead, we went scrambling up
over the rocks and snow for an hour or more.

The quantity of snow we found up there was a surprise to me, for, from
below the amount seemed trifling. There had been a heavy fall up in the
range a month before, and this snow, drifting into the gullies, had
settled into compact masses, the surface of which, on this, the southern
face of the mountain, being every day slightly softened by the heat of
the sun, and every night frozen solid again, made the footing
exceedingly treacherous. Whenever, therefore, we found it necessary to
cross one of these steep-tilted snow-beds we did so with the greatest
caution.

We had been climbing, as I have said, for more than an hour, and were
nearing the top of the ridge, when Dick stopped and silently beckoned to
me to come up to where he lay, crouching under shelter of a little
ledge.

"Smell anything?" he whispered.

I gave a sniff and raised my eyebrows inquiringly.

"Sheep?" said I, softly.

My companion nodded.

"They must be somewhere close by," said he, in a voice hardly audible.
"Go very carefully and keep your eyes wide open. If you see anything,
stop instantly."

We were lying side by side upon the rocks, Dick considerately waiting a
moment while I got my breath again, and were just about to crawl
forward, when there came the sound of a sudden rush of hoofs and a
clatter of stones from some invisible point ahead of us, and then dead
silence again.

"They've winded us and gone off," whispered Dick. But the next moment he
added eagerly, "There they are! Look! There they are! Up there! See? My!
What a chance!"

Immediately on our left was a deep gorge, so narrow and precipitous that
we could not see the bottom of it from where we lay. The sheep, having
seemingly got wind of us, with that agility which is always so
astonishing in such heavy animals, had rushed down one side of the
precipitous gorge and up the other, and now, there they were, all
standing in a row--eleven of them--on the opposite summit, looking down,
not at us, but at something immediately below them.

"What do you suppose it is, Dick?" I whispered.

"Don't know," my companion replied. "Mountain-lion, perhaps: they are
very partial to mutton. Anyhow," he continued, "if we want to get a shot
we must shoot from here: we can't move without the sheep seeing us, and
they'd be off like a flash if they did. You take a shot, Frank. Take the
nearest one. Sight for two hundred yards."

"No," I replied. "You shoot. I shall miss: I'm too unsteady for want of
breath."

"All right."

Raising himself a fraction of an inch at a time until he had come to a
kneeling position, Dick pushed his rifle-barrel through a crevice in the
rocks, took aim and fired. The nearest sheep, a fine fellow with a
handsome pair of horns, pitched forward, fell headlong from the ledge
upon which he had been standing and vanished from our sight among the
broken rocks below; while the others turned tail and fled up the
mountain, disappearing also in a minute or less.

"Come on!" cried Dick, springing to his feet. "Let's go across and get
him. Round this way. Don't trust to that slope of ice: you may slip and
break your neck."

"But the mountain-lion, Dick," I protested. "Suppose there's a
mountain-lion down there."

"Oh, never mind him!" Dick exclaimed. "If there was one, he's gone by
this time. And even if he should be there yet, he'd skip the moment he
saw us. We needn't mind him. Come on!"

Away we went, therefore, Dick in the lead, and scrambling quickly though
carefully down the rocky wall, we made our way up the bed of the ravine
until we found ourselves opposite the ledge upon which the sheep had
been standing. Here we discovered that the wall of the gorge was split
from top to bottom by a narrow cleft--previously invisible to us--filled
with hard snow, and whether the sheep had been standing on the right
side or the left of this crevice, and therefore on which side the big
ram had fallen, we could not tell; for the wall of the gorge, besides
being exceedingly rough, was littered with great masses of rock against
any of which the body of the sheep might have lodged.

"I'll tell you what, Frank," said my companion. "It might take us an
hour or two to search all the cracks and crannies here. The best plan
will be to climb straight up to the ledge where the sheep stood and look
down. Then, if he is lodged against the upper side of any of these
rocks, we shall be able to see him. But as we can't tell whether he was
standing on the right or the left of this crevice, suppose you climb up
one side while I go up the other."

"All right," said I. "You take the one on the left and I'll go up on
this side."

It was a laborious climb for both of us--and how those sheep got up
there so quickly is a wonder to me still--but as my side of the crevice
happened to be easier of ascent than Dick's I got so far ahead of him
that I presently found myself about fifty yards in the lead.

At this point, however, I met with an obstruction which at first seemed
likely to stop me altogether. The fallen rocks were so big, and piled so
high, that I could not get over them, and for a moment I thought I
should be forced to go back and try another passage. Before resorting
to this measure, though, I thought I would attempt to get round the
barrier by taking to the snow-bank, supporting myself by holding on to
the rocks. To do this I should need the use of both my hands, so, as my
rifle had no strap by which to hang it over my shoulder, I took out my
handkerchief, tied one end to the trigger-guard, took the other end in
my teeth, and slinging the weapon behind me, I seized the rock with both
hands and set one foot on the snow.

It was at this moment that Dick, down below me on the other side of the
crevice, while in the act of crawling up over a big rock, caught a
glimpse of something moving over on my side, and the next instant, out
from between two great fragments of granite rushed a cinnamon bear and
went charging up the slope after me.

The bear--as we discovered afterward--had found our sheep, and was
agreeably engaged in tearing it to pieces, when he caught a whiff of me.
He was an old bear, and had very likely been chased and shot at more
than once in the past few years--since the white men had begun to invade
his domain--and having conceived a strong antipathy for those
interfering bipeds which walked on their hind legs and carried
"thunder-sticks" in their fore paws, he decided instantly that, before
finishing his dinner, he would just dash out and finish me.

And very near he came to doing it. It was only Dick's quick sight and
his equally quick shout that saved me.

My companion's warning cry to jump could have but one meaning: there was
nowhere to jump except out upon the snow-bank; and recovering from my
first momentary panic, I let go my rifle and sprang out from the rocks.

My hope was that I should be able to keep my footing long enough to
scramble across to the rocks on the other side; but in this I was
disappointed. The snow-bed lay at an angle as steep as a church roof,
and while its surface was slightly softened by the sun, just beneath it
was as hard and as slippery as glass. Consequently, the moment my feet
struck it they slipped from under me, down I went on my face, and in
spite of all my frantic clawing and scratching I began to slide briskly
and steadily down-hill.

The bear--most fortunately for me--seemed to be less cunning than most
of his fellows. Had he paused for a moment to reason it out, he would
have seen that by waiting five seconds he might leap upon my back as I
went by. Luckily, however, he did not reason it out, but the instant he
saw me jump he jumped too, and he, too, began sliding down the icy slope
ahead of me; for being, as I said, an old bear, his blunted claws could
get no hold.

It was an odd situation, and "to a man up a tree," as the saying is, it
might have been entertaining. Here was the pursuer retreating backward
from the pursued, while the pursued, albeit with extreme reluctance, was
pursuing the pursuer--also backward.

It was like a nightmare--and a real, live, untamed broncho of a
nightmare at that--but luckily it did not last long. Finding that no
efforts of mine would arrest my downward progress, and knowing that the
bear, reaching the bottom first, need only stand there with his mouth
wide open and wait for me to fall into it, I whirled myself over and
over sideways, until presently my hand struck the rocks, my finger-tips
caught upon a little projection, and there I hung on for dear life, not
daring to move a muscle for fear my hold should slip.

But from this uncomfortable predicament I was promptly relieved. I had
not hung there five seconds ere the sharp report of a rifle rang out,
and then another, and next came Dick's voice hailing me:

"All right, Frank! I've got him! Hold on: I'm coming up!"

Half a minute later, as I lay there face downward on the ice, I heard
footsteps just above me, a firm hand grasped my wrist, and a cheerful
voice said:

"Come on up, old chap. I can steady you."

"But the bear, Dick! The bear!" I cried, as I rose to my knees.

"Dead as a door-nail," he replied, calmly. "Look."

I glanced over my shoulder down the slope. There, on his back among the
rocks, lay the cinnamon, his great arms spread out and his head hanging
over, motionless. As the snarling beast had slid past him, not ten feet
away, Dick, with his Winchester repeater, had shot him once through the
heart and once in the base of the skull, so that the bear was stone dead
ere he fell from the little two-foot ice-cliff at the bottom of the
slope.

As for myself, I had had such a scare and was so completely exhausted by
my vehement struggles during the past couple of minutes, that for a
quarter of an hour I lay on the rocks panting and gasping ere I could
get my lungs and my muscles back into working order again.

As soon as I could do so, however, I sat up, and holding out my hand to
my companion, I said:

"Thanks, old chap. I'm mighty glad you were on hand, or, I'm afraid, it
would have been all up with me."

"It was a pretty close shave," replied Dick; "rather too close for
comfort. He meant mischief, sure enough. Well, he's out of mischief now,
all right. Let's go down and look at him."

"I suppose," said I, "it was the bear that the sheep were looking down
at when they stood up there on the ledge all in a row."

"Yes, that was it. If I'd known it was a bear they were staring at I'd
have left them alone. A mountain-lion I'm not afraid of: he'll run
ninety-nine times out of a hundred. But a cinnamon bear is quite another
thing: the less you have to do with them, the better."

"Well, as far as I'm concerned," said I, "the less I have to do with
them, the better it will suit me. If this fellow is a sample of his
tribe I'm very willing to forego their further acquaintance: my first
interview came too unpleasantly near to being my last. Come on; let's go
down."




CHAPTER III

THE MESCALERO VALLEY


It had been our intention to take off the bear's hide and carry it home
with us, but we found that he was such a shabby old specimen that the
skin was not worth the carriage, so, after cutting out his claws as
trophies, we went on to inspect our sheep. Here again we found that "the
game was not worth the candle," as the saying is, for the bear had torn
the carcass so badly as to render it useless, while the horns, which at
a distance and seen against the sky-line, had looked so imposing, proved
to be too much chipped and broken to be any good.

My rifle we found lying beside the bear, it also having slid down the
ice-slope when I dropped it.

"Well, Frank," remarked my companion, "our hunt so far doesn't seem to
have had much result--unless you count the experience as something."

"Which I most decidedly do," I interjected.

"You are right enough there," replied Dick; "there's no gainsaying that.
Well, what I was going to say was that the day is early yet, and if you
like there is still time for us to go off and have a try for a deer. I
should like to take home something to show for our day's work."

"Very well," said I. "Which way should we take? There are no deer up
here among the rocks, I suppose."

"Why, I propose that we go up over this ridge here and try the country
to the southwest. I've never been down there myself, having always up to
the present hunted to the north and east of camp; but I've often thought
of trying it: it is a likely-looking country, quite different from that
on the Mosby side of the divide: high mesa land cut up by deep cañons.
What do you say?"

"Anything you like," I answered. "It is all new to me, and one direction
is as good as another."

"Very well, then, let us get up over the ridge at once and make a
start."

Having discovered a place easier of ascent than those by which we had
first tried to climb up, we soon found ourselves on top of the ridge,
whence we could look out over the country we were intending to explore.

It was plain at a glance that the two sides of the divide were very
different. Behind us, to the north, rose Mescalero Mountain, bare,
rugged and seamed with strips of snow. From this mountain, as from a
center, there radiated in all directions great spurs, like fingers
spread out, on one of which we were then standing. Looking southward, we
could see that our spur continued for many miles in the form of a chain
of round-topped mountains, well covered with timber, the elevation of
which diminished pretty regularly the further they receded from the
parent stem. On the left hand side of this chain--the eastern, or Mosby
side--the country was very rough and broken: from where we stood we
could see nothing but the tops of mountains, some sharp and rugged, some
round and tree-covered, seemingly massed together without order or
regularity. But to the south and southwest it was very different. Here
the land lying embraced between two of the spurs was spread out like a
great fan-shaped park, which, though it sloped away pretty sharply, was
fairly smooth, except where several dark lines indicated the presence of
cañons of unknown depth. The whole stretch, as far as we could
distinguish, was pretty well covered with timber, though occasional open
spaces showed here and there, some of two or three acres and some of
two or three square miles in extent.

"Just the country for black-tail," said Dick, "especially at this time
of year--the beginning of winter. For, you see, it lies very much lower
on the average than the Mosby side, and the snow consequently will not
come so early nor stay so late. It ought to be a great hunting-ground."

"It is a curious thing to find an open stretch like that in the midst of
the mountains," said I. "What is it called?"

"The Mescalero valley. The professor says it was once an arm of the
sea--and it looks like it, doesn't it? Over on the Mosby side the rocks
are all granite and porphyry, tilted up at all sorts of angles; but down
there it is sandstone and limestone, lying flat--a sure sign that it was
once the bottom of a sea."

"Is the valley inhabited?" I asked.

"Down at the southern end, about fifty miles away, there is a Mexican
settlement, at the foot of those twin peaks you see down there standing
all alone in the midst of the valley--the Dos Hermanos: Two Brothers,
they are called--but up at this end there are no inhabitants, I
believe."

"Well, there will be some day, I expect," said I. "It ought to be a
fine situation for a saw-mill, for instance."

"I don't know about that. There would be no way of getting your product
to market. Old Jeff Andrews, the founder of Mosby, told me about it
once--he's been across it two or three times--and he says that the
country is so slashed with cañons that a wheeled vehicle couldn't travel
across it, and consequently the expense of road-making would amount to
about as much as the value of the timber."

"I see. And, of course, the streams are much too shallow to float out
the logs. Well, let us get along down."

"All right. By the way, before we start, there was one thing I wanted to
say:--If we should happen to get separated, all you have to do is to
turn your face eastward, climb up over the Mosby Ridge, and you'll find
yourself on our own creek, either above or below the town. It's very
plain; you can hardly lose yourself--by daylight at any rate. So, now,
let's be off."

The climb down on this side we found to be very much steeper than the
climb up on the other had been. We dropped, by Dick's guess, about
three thousand feet in the three miles we traversed ere we found
ourselves in the midst of the thick timber, walking on comparatively
level ground. Keeping along the eastern side of the valley, in the
neighborhood of the Mosby Ridge, we made our way forward, steering by
the sun--for the trees were so thick we could see but a short distance
ahead--when we came upon one of the little open spaces I have mentioned.
We were just about to walk out from among the trees, when my companion,
with a sudden, "Pst!" stepped behind a tree-trunk and went down on one
knee. Without knowing the reason for this move, I did the same, and on
my making a motion with my eyebrows, as much as to say, "What's up?"
Dick whispered:

"Do you see that white patch on the other side of the clearing? An
antelope with its back to us. I'll try to draw him over here, so that
you may get a shot."

So saying, Dick took out a red cotton handkerchief, poked the corner of
it into the muzzle of his rifle, and standing erect behind his tree,
held out his flag at right angles.

At first the antelope took no notice, but presently, catching a glimpse
of the strange object out of the corner of his eye, he whirled round
and stood for a moment facing us with his head held high. A slight puff
of wind fluttered the handkerchief; the antelope started as though to
run; but finding himself unhurt, his curiosity got the better of his
fears, and he came trotting straight across the clearing in order to get
a closer view. At about a hundred yards distance he stopped, his body
turned broadside to us, all ready to bolt at the shortest notice, when
Dick whispered to me to shoot.

[Illustration: "IT WAS A SPLENDID CHANCE; NOBODY COULD ASK FOR A BETTER
TARGET."]

It was a splendid chance; nobody could ask for a better target; but do
you think I could hold that rifle steady? Not a bit of it! Instead of
one sight, I could see half a dozen; and finding that the longer I aimed
the more I trembled, I at length pulled the trigger and chanced it.
Where the bullet went I know not: somewhere southward; and so did the
antelope, and at much the same pace, if I am any judge of speed.

"Never mind, old chap," said Dick, laughing. "That is liable to happen
to anybody. Most people get a touch of the buck-fever the first time
they try to shoot a wild animal. You'll probably find yourself all right
the next chance you get."

"I'm afraid there's not likely to be a 'next chance,' is there?" I
asked. "Won't that shot scare all the deer out of the country?"

"I hardly think so: the deer are almost never disturbed down here; it
isn't like the Mosby side, where the prospectors are tramping over the
hills all the time."

"Don't they ever come down here, then?"

"No, never. There is a common saying, as you know, perhaps, that 'gold
is where you find it'; meaning that it may be anywhere--one place is as
likely as another. But, all the same, the prospectors seem to think the
chances are better among the granite and porphyry rocks on the other
side, where the formation has been cracked and broken and heaved up on
end by volcanic force. They never trouble to come down here, where any
one can see at a glance that the deposits have never been disturbed
since they were first laid down at the bottom of a great inlet of the
ocean."

"I see what you mean: and as nobody ever comes down here the deer are
not fidgety and suspicious as they would be if they were always being
disturbed."

"That's it, exactly. They are so unused to the presence of human beings
that I doubt if they would take any notice of your shot except to cock
their ears and sniff at the breeze for a minute or two. Anyhow, we'll go
ahead and find out. Let us go across this clearing and see if there
isn't a spring on the other side. That antelope was drinking when we
first saw him, if I'm not mistaken."

Sure enough, just before we entered the trees again, we came upon a pool
of water around the softened rim of which were many tracks of animals.

"Hallo!" cried Dick. "Just look here! See the wolf tracks--any number of
them. It must be a great wolf country as well as a great deer
country--in fact, because it is a great deer country. I shouldn't like
to be caught here in the winter with so many wolves about; they are
unpleasant neighbors when food is scarce."

"Are they dangerous to a man with a gun?" I asked.

"Yes, they are. One wolf--or even two--doesn't matter much to a man with
a breach-loading rifle; but when a dozen or twenty get after you, you'll
do well to go up a tree and stay there. A pack of hungry wolves is no
trifle, I can tell you."

"Have you ever had any experience with them yourself?"

"I did once, and a mighty distressing one it was, though it didn't hurt
me, personally. I was out hunting with my dog, Blucher, a little
short-legged, long-bodied fellow of no particular breed, and was up
among the tall timber east of the house, going along suspecting nothing,
when Blucher, all of a sudden, began to whine and crowd against my legs.
I looked back, and there I saw six big timber-wolves slipping down a
hill about a quarter of a mile behind me. They stopped when I stopped,
but as soon as I moved, on they came again--it was very uncomfortable,
especially when two of them vanished among the trees, and I couldn't
tell whether they might not be running to get round the other side of
me. I went on up the next rise, the wolves keeping about the same
distance behind me, and as soon as we were out of their sight, Blucher
and I ran for it. But it was no use: the wolves had taken the same
opportunity, and when I looked back again, there they were, all six of
them, not a hundred yards behind this time.

"It began to look serious; for though it was possible that they were
after Blucher, and not after me at all, I couldn't be sure of that. So,
first picking out a tree to go up in case of necessity, I knelt down
and fired into the bunch, getting one. I had hoped that the others would
turn and run, but the shot seemed to have a directly opposite effect:
the remaining five wolves came charging straight at me.

"I gave the dog one kick and yelled at him to 'Go home!'--it was all I
could do--dropped my rifle, jumped for a branch, and was out of reach
when the wolves rushed past in pursuit of Blucher.

"Poor little beast! Though he was a mongrel with no pretence at a
pedigree, he was a good hunting dog and a faithful friend. But what
chance had he in a race with five long-legged, half-starved
timber-wolves? It happened out of my sight, I am glad to say; all I
heard was one yelp, followed by an angry snarling, and then all was
silent again."

Dick paused for a moment, his face looking very grim for a boy, and then
continued: "I've hated the sight and the sound of wolves ever since. Of
course, I know they were only following their nature, but--I can't help
it--I hate a wolf, and that's all there is to it."

"I don't wonder," said I. "Any one----"

"Hark!" cried Dick, clapping his hand on my arm. "Did you hear that?
Listen!"

We stood silent for a moment, and then, far off in the direction from
which we had come, I heard a curious whimpering sound, the nature of
which I could not understand.

"What is it?" I whispered, involuntarily sinking my voice.

"Wolves--hunting."

"Hunting what?"

"I don't know; but we'll move away from here, anyhow. Come on."

Dick's manner, more than his words, made me feel a little uneasy and I
followed him very willingly as he set off at a smart walk through the
timber.

"You don't suppose they are hunting us, Dick, do you?" I asked, as we
strode along side by side.

"I can't tell yet. It seems hardly likely--in daylight, and at this time
of year. I could understand it if it were winter. If they are hunting
us, it is probably because they, like the deer, are unacquainted with
men, and never having been shot at, they don't know what danger they are
running into. Still, I feel a little suspicious that it is our trail
they are following. They are coming down right on the line we took, at
any rate. We shall be able to decide, though, in a minute or two. Look
ahead. Do you see how the trees are thinning out? We are coming to
another open space, a big one, I think; I noticed it when we were up on
the ridge just now."

"What good will that do us?" I asked.

"We shall be able to get a sight of them. Come on. I'll show you."

True enough, we presently stepped out from among the trees again and
found ourselves on the edge of another open, grassy space, very much
larger than the last one. It was about three hundred yards across to the
other side, and a mile in length from east to west. We had struck it
about midway of its east-and-west length. Out into the open Dick walked
some twenty yards, and there stopped once more to listen.

We had not long to wait. The eager whimper came again, much nearer, and
now and then a quavering howl. I did not like the sound at all. I looked
at Dick, who was standing "facing the music" and frowning thoughtfully.

"Well, Dick!" I exclaimed, getting impatient.

"I think they are after us," said he.

"And what do you mean to do? Not stay out here in the open, I suppose."

"Not we; at least, not for more than five minutes. Look here, Frank,"
he went on, speaking quickly. "I'll tell you what I propose to do. We'll
keep out here in the open, about this distance from the trees, and make
straight eastward for the Mosby Ridge; it is only half a mile or so to
the woods at that end of the clearing and we can make it in five
minutes. Then, if the wolves are truly hunting us, they will follow our
trail out into the open, when we shall get a sight of them and be able
to count them. If they are only three or four we can handle them all
right, but if there is a big pack of them we shall have to take to a
tree. Give me your rifle to carry--my breathing machinery is better used
to it than yours--and we'll make a run for it."

It was only a short half-mile we had to run--quite enough for me,
though--and under the first tree we came to, Dick stopped.

"This will do," said he, handing back my rifle. "We'll wait here now and
watch. Hark! They're getting pretty close. Hallo! Hallo! Why, look
there, Frank!"

That Dick should thus exclaim was not to be wondered at, for out from
the trees, scarce a hundred paces from us, there came, not the wolves,
but a man! And such an odd-looking man, riding on such an odd-looking
steed!

"What is he riding on, Dick?" I asked. "A mule?"

"No; a burro--a jack--a donkey; a big one, too; and it need be, for he
is a tremendous fellow. Did you ever see such a chest?"

"Is he an Indian?"

"No; a Mexican. An Indian wouldn't deign to ride a burro. I understand
it all now. The wolves are not hunting us at all: they are after the
donkey. And the man is aware of it, too: see how he keeps looking
behind. What is that thing he is carrying in his left hand? A bow?"

"Yes; a bow. And a quiver of arrows over his shoulder."

"So he has! He doesn't seem to be in much of a hurry, does he? Evidently
he is not much afraid of the wolves. Why, he's stopping to wait for
them! He's a plucky fellow. Why, Frank, just look! Did you ever see such
a queer-looking specimen?"

This exclamation was drawn from my companion involuntarily when the
Mexican, checking his donkey, sprang to the ground. He certainly was a
queer-looking specimen. If he had looked like a giant on donkey-back, he
looked like a dwarf on foot; for, though his head was big and his body
huge, his legs were so short that he appeared to be scarce five feet
high; while his muscular arms were of such length that he could touch
his knees without stooping.

To add to his strange appearance, the man was clad in a long, sleeveless
coat made of deer-skin, with the hairy side out.

We had hardly had time to take in all these peculiarities when Dick once
more exclaimed:

"Ah! Here they come! One, two, three--only five of them after all."

As he spoke, the wolves came loping out from among the trees; but the
moment they struck our cross-trail the suspicious, wary creatures all
stopped with one accord, puzzled by coming upon a scent they had not
expected.

This was the Mexican's opportunity. Raising his long left arm, he drew
an arrow to its head and let fly.

I thought he had missed, for I saw the arrow strike the ground and knock
up a little puff of dust. But I was mistaken. One of the wolves gave a
yelp, ran back a few steps, fell down, got up again and ran another few
steps, fell again, and this time lay motionless. The arrow had gone
right through him!

Almost at the same instant Dick raised his rifle and fired. The shot
was electrical. One of the wolves fell, when the remaining three
instantly turned tail and ran.

But not only did the wolves run: the Mexican, casting one glance in our
direction, sprang upon his donkey and away he went, at a pace that was
surprising considering the respective sizes of man and beast.

It was in vain that Dick ran out from under our tree and shouted after
him something in Spanish. I could distinguish the word, _amigos_, two or
three times repeated, but the man took no notice. Perhaps he did not
believe in friendships so suddenly declared. At any rate, he neither
looked back nor slackened his pace, and in a minute or less he and his
faithful steed vanished into the timber on the south side of the
clearing.

The whole incident had not occupied five minutes; but for the presence
of the two dead wolves one would have been tempted to believe it had
never happened at all--solitude and silence reigned once more.

"Well, wasn't that a queer thing!" cried Dick.

"It certainly was," I replied. "I wonder who the man is. Anyhow, he's
not coming back, so let's go and pick up his arrow."




CHAPTER IV

RACING THE STORM


Walking over to where the two wolves lay, we soon found the arrow, its
head buried out of sight in the hard ground, showing with what force it
had come from the bow. It was carefully made of a bit of some hard wood,
scraped down to the proper diameter, and fitted with three
feathers--eagle feathers, Dick said--one-third as long as the shaft,
very neatly bound on with some kind of fine sinew.

"Looks like a Ute arrow," remarked my companion, as he stooped to pick
it up; "yet the man was a Mexican, I am sure. I suppose he must have got
it from the Indians."

"Do the Utes use copper arrow-heads?" I asked.

"No, they don't. They use iron or steel nowadays. Why do you ask?"

"Because this arrow-head is copper," I replied.

"Why, so it is!" cried Dick, rubbing the soil from the point on his
trouser-leg. "That's very odd. I never saw one before. I feel pretty
sure the Indians never use copper: it is too soft. This bit seems to
take an edge pretty well, though. See, the point doesn't seem to have
been damaged by sticking into the ground; and it has been filed pretty
sharp, too; or, what is more likely, rubbed sharp on a stone. It has
evidently been made by hand from a piece of native copper."

"I wonder why the man should choose to use copper," said I. "Though when
you come to think of it, Dick," I added, "I don't see why it shouldn't
make a pretty good arrow-head. It is soft metal, of course, but it is
only soft by comparison with other metals. This wedge of copper weighs
two or three ounces, and it is quite hard enough to go through the hide
of an animal at twenty or thirty yards' distance when 'fired' with the
force that this one was."

"That's true. And I expect the explanation is simple enough why the man
uses copper. It is probably from necessity and not from choice. Like
nearly all Mexicans of the peon class, he probably never has a cent of
money in his possession. Consequently, as he can't buy a gun, he uses a
bow; and for the same reason, being unable to procure iron for
arrow-heads, he uses copper. I expect he comes from the settlement at
the foot of the valley, for copper is a very common metal down there."

"Why should it be more common there than elsewhere?" I asked.

"Well, that's the question--and a very interesting question, too. The
professor and I were down in that neighborhood about a year ago, and on
going into the village we were a good deal surprised to find that every
household seemed to possess a bowl or a pot or a cup or a dipper or all
four, perhaps, hammered out of native copper--all of them having the
appearance of great age. There were dozens of them altogether."

"How do they get them?" I asked.

"That's the question again--and the Mexicans themselves don't seem to
know. They say, if you ask them, that they've always had them. And the
professor did ask them. He went into one house after another and
questioned the people, especially the old people, as to where the copper
came from; but none of them could give him any information. I wondered
why he should be so persevering in the matter--though when there is
anything he desires to learn, no trouble is too much for him--but after
we had left the place he explained it all to me, and then I ceased to
wonder."

"What was his explanation, then?"

"He told me that when he was in Santa Fé about fifteen years before, he
made the acquaintance of a Spanish gentleman of the remarkable name of
Blake----"

"Blake!" I interrupted. "That's a queer name for a Spaniard."

"Yes," replied Dick. "The professor says he was a descendant of one of
those Irishmen who fled to the continent in the time of William III, of
England, most of them going into the service of the king of France and
others to other countries--Austria and Spain in particular."

"Well, go ahead. Excuse me for interrupting."

"Well, this gentleman was engaged in hunting through the old Spanish
records kept there in Santa Fé, looking up something about the title to
a land-grant, I believe, and he told the professor that in the course of
his search he had frequently come across copies of reports to the
Spanish government of shipments of copper from a mine called the King
Philip mine. That it was a mine of importance was evident from the
frequency and regularity of the 'returns,' which were kept up for a
number of years, until somewhere about the year 1720, if I remember
rightly, they began to become irregular and then suddenly ceased
altogether."

"Why?"

"There was no definite statement as to why; but from the reports it
appeared that the miners were much harried by the Indians, sometimes the
Navajos and sometimes the Utes, while the loss, partial or total, of two
or three trains with their escorts, seemed to bring matters to a climax.
Shipments ceased and the mine was abandoned."

"That's interesting," said I. "And where was this King Philip mine?"

"The gentleman could not say. There seemed to be no map or description
of any kind among the records; but from casual statements, such as notes
of the trains being delayed by floods in this or that creek, or by snow
blockades on certain passes, he concluded that the mine was somewhere up
in this direction."

"Well, that is certainly very interesting. And the professor, I suppose,
concludes that the Mexicans down there at---- What's the name of the
place?"

"Hermanos--called so after the two peaks, at the foot of which it
stands."

"The professor concludes, I suppose, that the Mexicans' unusual supply
of copper pots and pans came originally from the King Philip mine."

"Yes; and I've no doubt they did; though the Mexicans themselves had
never heard of such a mine. Yet--and it shows how names will stick long
after people have forgotten their origin--yet, just outside the village
there stands a big, square adobe building, showing four blank walls to
the outside, with a single gateway cut through one of them, flat-roofed
and battlemented--a regular fortress--and it is called to this day the
_Casa del Rey_:--the King's House. Now, why should it be called the
King's House? The Mexicans have no idea; but to me it seems plain
enough. The King Philip mine was probably a royal mine, and the
residence of the king's representative, the storage-place for the
product of the mine, the headquarters of the soldier escort, would
naturally be called the King's House."

"It seems likely, doesn't it? Is that the professor's opinion?"

"Yes. He feels sure that the King Philip mine is not far from the
village; possibly--in fact, probably--in the Dos Hermanos mountains."

"And did he ever make any attempt to find it?"

"Not he. Prospecting is altogether out of his line. It was only the
historical side of the matter that interested him. All he did was to
write to the Señor Blake at Cadiz, in Spain, telling him about it;
though whether the letter ever reached its destination he has never
heard."

"And who lives in the King's House now?" I asked. "Anybody?"

"Yes. It is occupied by a man named Galvez, the 'padron' of the village,
who owns, or claims, all the country down there for five miles
square--the Hermanos Grant. We did not see him when we were there, but
from what we heard of him, he seems to regard himself as lord of
creation in those parts, owning not only the land, but the village and
the villagers, too."

"How so? How can he own the villagers?"

"Why, it is not an uncommon state of affairs in these remote Mexican
settlements. The padron provides the people with the clothes or the
tools or the seed they require on credit, taking security on next year's
crop, and so manages matters as to get them into debt and keep them
there; for they are an improvident lot. In this way they fall into a
state of chronic indebtedness, working their land practically for the
benefit of the padron and becoming in effect little better than slaves."

"I see. A pretty miserable condition for the poor people, isn't it? And
doesn't this man, Galvez, with his superior
intelligence--presumably--know anything of the King Philip mine?"

"Apparently not."

"My word, Dick!" I exclaimed. "What fun it would be to go and hunt for
it ourselves, wouldn't it?"

"Wouldn't it! I've often thought of it before, but I know the professor
would never consent. He would consider it a waste of time. It's an idea
worth keeping in mind, though, at any rate. There's never any telling
what may turn up. We might get the chance somehow; though I confess I
don't see how. But we must be moving, Frank," said he, suddenly changing
the subject. "It's getting latish. Hallo!"

"What's the matter?" I asked, looking wonderingly at my companion, who,
with his hand held up to protect his eyes from the glare, was standing,
staring at the sun.

"Why, the matter is, Frank, that the professor will say that I've
neglected my duty, I'm afraid. You remember he told me to look out for a
change of weather? I'd forgotten all about it."

"Well," said I, "I don't see that that matters. There's no sign of a
change, is there?"

"Yes, there is. Look up there. Do you see a number of tiny specks all
hurrying across the face of the sun from north to south?"

"Yes. What is it?"

"Snow."

"Snow!" I cried, incredulously. "How can it be snow, when there isn't a
scrap of cloud visible anywhere?"

"It is snow, all the same," said Dick; "old snow blown from the other
side of Mescalero."

"But how can that be, Dick? All the snow we found up there was packed
like ice."

"Ah, but we were on the south side. On the north side, where the sun has
no effect, it is still as loose and as powdery as it was when it fell."

"Of course. I hadn't thought of that. There must be a pretty stiff
breeze blowing overhead to keep it hung up in the sky like that and not
allow a speck of it to fall down here."

"Yes, it's blowing great guns up there, all right, and I am afraid we
shall be getting it ourselves before long. We must dig out of here hot
foot, Frank. I hope we haven't stayed too long as it is."

It was hard to believe that there was anything to fear from the weather,
with the unclouded sun shining down upon us with such power as to be
almost uncomfortably hot; but Dick, I could see, felt uneasy, and as I
could not presume to set up my judgment against his larger experience, I
did not wait to ask any more questions, but set off side by side with
him when he started eastward at a pace which required the saving of all
my breath to keep up with him.

We had been walking through the woods for about half an hour and were
expecting to begin the ascent of the Mosby Ridge in a few minutes, when
we were brought to a standstill by coming suddenly upon the edge of a
deep cleft in the earth, cutting across our course at right angles. It
was one of the many cañons for which the Mescalero valley was notorious.

Looking across the cañon, we could see that the opposite wall was
composed of a thick bed of limestone overlying another of sandstone, the
latter, being the softer, so scooped out that the limestone cap
projected several feet beyond it. It appeared to be quite unscalable,
and on our side it was doubtless the same, for, on cautiously
approaching the edge as near as we dared, we could see that the cliff
fell sheer for three hundred feet or more.

"No getting down here!" cried Dick. "Up stream, Frank! The cañon will
shallow in that direction."

Away we went again along the edge of the gorge, and presently were
rejoiced to find a place where the cliff had broken away, enabling us,
with care, to climb down to the bottom. The other side, however,
presented no possible chance of getting out, so on we went, following up
the dry bed of the arroyo, looking out sharply for some break by which
we might climb up, when, on rounding a slight bend, Dick stopped so
suddenly that I, who was close on his heels, bumped up against him.

"What's the matter, Dick?" I asked. "What are you stopping for?"

"Look up there at Mescalero," said he.

It was the first glimpse of the mountain we had had since entering the
woods at the head of the valley, and the change in its appearance was
alarming. The only part of it we could see was the summit, standing out
clear and sharp against the sky; all the rest of it, and of the whole
range as well, was shrouded by a heavy gray cloud, which, creeping round
either side of the peak, was rolling down our side of the range, slowly
and steadily filling up and blotting out each gully and ravine as it
came to it. There was a stealthy, vindictive look about it I did not at
all like.

"Snow, Dick?" I asked.

"Yes, and lots of it, I'm afraid. See how the cloud comes creeping
down--like cold molasses. I expect it is so heavy with snow that it
can't float in the thin air up there, and the north wind is just
shouldering it up over the range from behind. We've got to get out of
here, Frank, as fast as we can and make the top of the Mosby Ridge, if
possible, before that cloud catches us. Once on the other side, we're
pretty safe: I know the country; but on this side I don't. So, let us
waste no more time--we have none to waste, I can tell you."

Nor did we waste any, for neither of us had any inclination to linger,
but pushing forward once more along the bottom of the cañon, we
presently espied a place where we thought we might climb out. Scrambling
up the steep slope of shaly detritus, we had come almost to the top,
when to our disappointment we found our further progress barred by a
little cliff, not more than eight feet high, but slightly overhanging,
and so smooth that there was no hold for either feet or fingers.

"Up on my shoulders, Frank!" cried my companion, laying down his rifle
and leaning his arms against the rock and his head against his arms.

In two seconds I was standing on his shoulders, but even then I could
not get any hold for my hands on the smooth, curved, shaly bank which
capped the limestone. Only a foot out of my reach, however, there grew a
little pine tree, about three inches thick, and whipping off my belt I
lashed at the tree trunk with it. The end of the belt flew round; I
caught it; and having now both ends in my hands I quickly relieved my
companion of his burden and crawled up out of the ravine.

Then, buckling the belt to the tree, I took the loose end in one hand,
and lying down flat I received and laid aside the two rifles which Dick
handed up to me, one at a time. Dick himself, though, was out of reach,
perceiving which, I pulled off my coat, firmly grasped the collar and
let down the other end to him, lying, myself, face downward upon the
stones, with the end of the belt held tight in the other hand.

"All set?" cried Dick; and, "All set!" I shouted in reply. There was a
violent jerk upon the coat, and the next thing, there was Dick himself
kneeling beside me.

"Well done, old chap!" cried he. "That was a great idea. Now, then,
let's be off. I'll carry the two rifles. It's plain sailing now.
Straight up the Ridge for those two great rocks that stand up there like
a gateway to the pass. I know the place. Only a couple of thousand feet
to climb and then we begin to go down-hill. We shall make it now. Come
on!"

The trees were thin just here, and as we started to ascend the pass we
obtained one more glimpse of Mescalero--the last one we were to get that
day. The bank of cloud had advanced about half a mile since we first
caught sight of it, while it had become so much thicker as the wind
rolled it up from the other side of the range, that now only the very
tip of the mountain showed above it. Even as we watched it, a great fold
of the cloud passed over the summit, hiding it altogether.

"See that, Dick?" said I.

"Yes," he replied. "A very big snow, I expect. Hark! Do you hear that
faint humming? The wind in the pines. We shall be getting it soon. Come
on, now; stick close to my heels; if I go too fast, call out."

Away we went up the pass, pressing forward at the utmost speed I could
stand, desperately anxious to get as far ahead as possible before the
storm should overtake us. The ascent, though very steep on this side,
presented no other special difficulty, and at the end of an hour we had
come close to the two great rocks for which we had been making.

All this time the sun continued to shine down upon us, though with
diminishing power as the hurrying snowflakes passing above our heads
became thicker and thicker; while, as to the storm-cloud itself, we
could not see how near it had come, for the pine-clad mountain, rising
high on our left hand, obstructed our view in that direction. That it
was not far off, though, we were pretty sure, for the humming of the
wind in the woods--the only thing by which we could judge--though faint
at first, had by this time increased to a roar.

The storm was, in fact, much nearer than we imagined, and just as we
passed between the "gateway" rocks it burst upon us with a fury and a
suddenness that, to me at least, were appalling.

Almost as though a door had been slammed in our faces, the light of the
sun was cut off, leaving us in twilight gloom, and with a roar like a
stampede of cattle across a wooden bridge, a swirling, blinding smother
of snow, driven by a furious wind, rushed through the "gateway," taking
us full in the face, with such violence that Dick was thrown back
against me, nearly knocking us both from our feet. Instinctively, we
crouched for shelter behind the rock, and there we waited a minute or
two to recover breath and collect our senses.

"Pretty bad," said Dick. "But it might have been worse: it isn't very
cold--not yet; we have only about two miles to go, and I know the lay of
the land. We'll start again as soon as you are ready. I'll go first and
you follow close behind. Whatever you do, don't lose sight of me for an
instant: it won't do to get lost. Hark! Did you hear that?"

There was a rending crash, as some big tree gave way before the storm.
It was a new danger, one I had not thought of before. I looked
apprehensively at my companion.

"Suppose one of them should fall on us, Dick," said I.

"Suppose it shouldn't," replied Dick. "That is just as easy to suppose,
and a good deal healthier."

I confess I had been feeling somewhat scared. The sudden gloom, the
astonishing fury of the wind, the confusing whirl and rush of the snow,
and then from some point unknown the sharp breaking of a tree, sounding
in the midst of the universal roar like the crack of a whip--all this,
coming all together and so suddenly, was quite enough, I think, to
"rattle" a town-bred boy.

But if panic is catching, so is courage. Dick's prompt and sensible
remark acted like a tonic. Springing to my feet, I cried:

"You are right, old chap! Come on. Let's step right out at once. I'm
ready."

It was most fortunate that Dick knew where he was, for the light was so
dim and the snow so thick that we could see but a few paces ahead; while
the wind, though beating in general against our left cheeks, was itself
useless as a guide, for, being deflected by the ridges and ravines of
the mountain, it would every now and then strike us square in the face,
stopping us dead, and the next moment leap upon us from behind, sending
me stumbling forward against my leader.

In spite of its vindictive and ceaseless assaults, though, Dick kept
straight on, his head bent and his cap pulled down over his ears; while
I, following three feet behind, kept him steadily in view. Presently he
stopped with a joyful shout.

"Hurrah, Frank!" he cried. "Look here! Now we are all right. Here's a
thread to hold on by: as good as a rope to a drowning man."

The "thread" was a little stream of water, appearing suddenly from I
know not where, and running off in the direction we were going.

"This will take us home, Frank!" my companion shouted in my ear. "It
runs down and joins our own creek about a quarter of a mile above the
house. With this for a guide we are all safe; we mustn't lose it, that's
all. And we won't do that: we'll get into it and walk in the water if we
have to. Best foot foremost, now! All down-hill! Hurrah, for us!"

Dick's cheerful view of the situation was very encouraging, though, as a
matter of fact, it was a pretty desperate struggle we had to get down
the mountain, with the darkness increasing and the snow becoming deeper
every minute. Indeed it was becoming a serious question with me whether
I could keep going much longer, when at the end of the most perilous
hour I ever went through, we at last came down to the junction of the
creeks, and turning to our right presently caught sight of a lighted
window.

Five minutes later we were safe inside the professor's house--and high
time too, for I could not have stood much more of it: I had just about
reached the end of my tether. But the warmth and rest and above all the
assurance of safety quickly had their effect, and very soon I found
myself seated before the fire consuming with infinite gusto a great bowl
of strong, hot soup which Romero had made all ready for us; thus
comfortably winding up the most eventful day of my existence--up to that
moment.




CHAPTER V

HOW DICK BROUGHT THE NEWS


"You ran it rather too close, Dick," said the professor, with a shake of
his head, when we had told him the story of our race with the storm. "I
was beginning to be afraid; not so much for you as for your companion:
it was too big an undertaking for him, considering that it was his first
day in the mountains; even leaving out the risk of the snow-storm."

"I'm afraid I was thoughtless," replied Dick, penitently; "especially in
not looking out for a change of weather. It did run us too close, as you
say--a great deal too close. But there is one thing I can do, anyhow, to
repair that error to some extent, and I'll be off at once and do it."

So saying, Dick, who by this time had finished his supper, jumped out of
his chair and began putting on his overcoat.

"Where are you off to, Dick?" I exclaimed. "Not going out again
to-night?"

"Only a little way," replied Dick. "Down to the town to let your uncle
know that you are all safe. He'll be pretty anxious, I expect."

I had thought of that, but I could see no way of getting over it. I
could not go myself, for even if I had dared to venture I had not the
strength for it, and of course I could not expect any one else to do it
for me. My first thought, therefore, when Dick announced that he was
going, was one of satisfaction; though my next thought, following very
quickly upon the first one, was to protest against his doing any such
thing.

"No, no, Dick," I cried, "it's too risky--you mustn't! Uncle Tom will be
worried, I know, but he will conclude that I am staying the night with
you. And though I should be glad to have his mind relieved, I don't
consider--and he would say the same, I'm pretty sure--that that is a
good enough reason for you to take such a risk."

"Thanks, old chap," replied Dick; "but it isn't so much of a risk as you
think. Going down wind to the town is a very different matter from
coming down that rough mountain with the storm beating on us from every
side. I've been over the trail a thousand times, and I believe I could
follow it with my eyes shut; and, anyhow, to lose your way is pretty
near impossible, you know, with the cañon on your right hand and the
mountain on your left. So, don't you worry yourself, Frank: I'll be
under cover again in an hour or less."

Seeing that the professor nodded approval, I protested no more, though I
still had my doubts about letting him go.

"Well, Dick," said I, "it's mighty good of you. I wish I could go, too,
but that is out of the question, I'm afraid: I should only hamper you if
I tried. I can tell you one thing, anyhow: Uncle Tom will appreciate
it--you may be sure of that."

In this I was right, though I little suspected at the moment in what
form his appreciation was to show itself. As a matter of fact, Dick's
action in braving the storm a second time that evening was to be a
turning-point in his fortune and mine.

"Good-night, Frank," said he. "I'll be back again in the morning, I
expect. Hope you'll sleep as well in my bed as I intend to do in yours.
Good-night."

So saying, Dick, this time overcoated, gloved and ear-capped, opened the
door and stepped out. Watching him from the window, I saw him striding
off down wind, to be lost to sight in ten seconds in the maze of driving
snow.

"Are you sure it's all right, Professor?" said I, anxiously. "There's
time yet to call him back."

"It is all right," replied my host, reassuringly. "You need not fear.
Dick has been out in many a storm before, and he knows very well how to
take care of himself. You may be sure I would not let him go if I
thought it were not all right. And now, I think, it would be well if you
took possession of Dick's bed. You have had a very hard day and need a
good long rest."

To this I made no objection, and early though it was, I was asleep in
five minutes, too tired to be disturbed even by the insistent banging
and howling of the storm outside.

Meanwhile, Uncle Tom, down in the town, was, as I had suspected,
fretting and fuming and worrying himself in his uncertainty as to
whether I was safe under cover or not.

The storm had taken the town by surprise, for the morning had opened
gloriously, clear and sharp and still, as it had done every day for a
month past, and most people naturally supposed there was to be another
day as fine as those which had gone before; little suspecting that the
north wind, up there among the icebound peaks and gorges of the mother
range, was at that moment marshaling its forces for a mad rush down into
the valley.

And how should they suspect? Of the three hundred people comprising the
population, not one, not even old Jeff Andrews himself, the patriarch of
the district, had spent more than two winters in the camp. In the year
of its founding there were about a dozen men and no women who had braved
the hardships of the first winter, but as the fame of the new camp
extended to the outer world, other people began to come in, slowly at
first and then in larger numbers, so that by this time the population
numbered, as I said, about three hundred souls, including twenty-one
women and two babies; while at a rough guess I should say there was
about two-thirds of a dog to each citizen, counting in the twelve
children of school age and the two babies as well.

These dogs, by the way, were the chief source of entertainment in the
town, for during the hours of daylight there was always a fight going on
somewhere, while at night most of them, especially the younger ones,
used to sit out in the middle of the street barking defiance at the
coyotes, which, from the hills all round, howled back at them in
unceasing chorus. This part of the programme was changed, however, later
in the winter, for one half-cloudy night the blacksmith's long-legged
shepherd pup, seated in front of the forge door, was barking himself
hoarse at the moon when a big timber-wolf came slipping down out of the
woods and finished the puppy's song and his existence with one snap.
After this the other dogs were more careful about the hours they kept.

But to return to the human part of the population. Considering how few
of them had spent a winter in this high valley; remembering that every
one of the grown-up citizens had been born in some other State, and that
the very great majority were newcomers in Colorado, it is not to be
wondered at that the storm should have caught them unawares. For, in
Colorado, if there is one thing almost impossible to forecast it is the
weather, especially in the mountains where it is made, where the
snow-storms and the thunder-storms, brewing in secret behind the peaks,
bounce out on you before you know it.

So, on this sunshiny morning, most people went about their usual
occupations unsuspicious of evil; it was only the few old-timers who
divined what was coming, and their little precautions, such as shutting
their doors and windows before leaving the house, merely excited a smile
or a word of chaff from the "plum-sure" newcomers. For it is always the
new arrival who thinks he can predict the weather; the old-stager,
having had experience enough to be aware that he knows nothing about it
for certain, can seldom be persuaded to venture a decided opinion.

Tied to a hitching-post outside the assayer's door that afternoon were
two ponies, and about two o'clock Mr. Warren, himself, and Uncle Tom,
issued from the house, prepared for their ride up on Cape Horn--a big,
bare mountain lying southeast of town. As they stepped down from the
porch, however, Warren happened to notice old Jeff Andrews walking up
the street, carrying over his shoulder a great buffalo-skin overcoat,
which, considering the warmth of the day, seemed rather out of place.

"Hallo, Jeff!" the assayer called out. "What are you carrying that thing
for? Are we going to have a change?"

Jeff, a gray-bearded, round-shouldered man of sixty, with a face burnt
all of one color by years of life in the open, paused for a moment
before replying, and then, knowing that the assayer was not one of those
"guying tenderfeet," for whom, as he expressed it, "he had no manner of
use," he answered genially:

"Well, gents, I ain't no weather prophet--I'll leave that business to
the latest arrival--but I have my suspicions. Just look up overhead."

The old man had detected the hurrying snowflakes passing across the face
of the sun, and though to Uncle Tom there was nothing unusual to be
seen, the assayer understood the signs.

"Wind, Jeff?" said he.

"And snow," replied the old prospector. "Was you going to ride up on
Cape Horn this evening, Mr. Warren? Well, if I was you, I wouldn't. Cape
Horn lies south o' here, and if a storm from the north catches you up
there on that bare mountain you may not be able to work your way back
again. If I was you, I'd put the ponies back in the stable and lay low
for a spell."

"Thank you, Jeff," responded the assayer. "I believe that's a good idea.
I think we shall do well, Tom, to postpone our trip. No use running the
risk of being caught out in a blizzard: it's a bit too dangerous to suit
me."

The ponies, therefore, were taken back to the stable and the two men,
returning to the house, sat down on the sunny porch to await
developments.

The snow-cloud was already half way down the range and it was not long
ere the murmur of the wind among the distant trees began to make itself
heard, giving warning of what was coming to a few of the more observant
people.

"It looks pretty threatening, Sam," said Uncle Tom. "I don't like the
way that cloud comes creeping down. I hope those boys will notice it in
time."

"I don't think you need worry about them," replied the assayer. "Young
Dick is well able to take care of himself. He knows the signs as well as
anybody."

"Well, I hope he'll notice them in time. Going indoors, are you?"

"Yes; if you don't mind, I'll leave you for the present. I have some
work I want to finish up. Let me know when it comes pretty close so that
I may get my windows shut. It will come with a 'whoop' when it does
come."

As the assayer rose to his feet, he observed across the street the
proprietor of the corner grocery standing in his doorway with his hands
in his pockets.

"Hallo, Jackson!" he called out. "You'd better take in those loose boxes
from the sidewalk if you want to save them: there's a big blow coming
pretty soon."

"Oh, I guess not," replied the grocer, a fat-faced, self-satisfied man,
one of those "dead-sure weather prophets" for whom old Jeff felt such
supreme contempt. "I reckon I'll chance it."

He cast a glance skyward, and deceived by the sparkling brilliancy of
the sun, he added under his breath, "Big blow! As if any one couldn't
see with half an eye that there isn't a sign of wind in the sky."

"All right, Jackson, suit yourself," replied Warren; adding on his part,
as an aside to Uncle Tom, "He'll change his mind in about half an hour,
if I'm not mistaken."

For about that length of time Uncle Tom continued to sit on the porch
watching the approaching cloud and listening to the increasing murmur of
the wind, when, on the crown of a high ridge about a mile above town he
saw all the pine trees with one accord suddenly bend their heads toward
him, as though making him a stately obeisance.

Springing out of his chair, Uncle Tom bolted into the house, slamming
the door behind him and calling out: "Here it comes, Sam! Here it
comes!"

It did. The roar of its approach was now plainly audible; there was a
hurrying and scurrying of men and women, a banging of doors and a
slamming down of windows; even the incredulous grocer, convinced at
last, made a dive for his loose boxes--but just too late.

With a shriek, as of triumph at catching them all unprepared, the wind
came raging down the street, making a clean sweep of everything. A young
mining camp is not as a rule over-particular about the amount of rubbish
that encumbers its streets, and Mosby was no exception to the rule, but
in five minutes it was swept as clean as though the twenty-one
housewives had been at work on it for a week with broom and
scrubbing-brush.

Heralded by a cloud of mingled dust and snow, a whole covey of paper
scraps, loose straw and a few hats, went whirling down the street,
followed by a dozen or two of empty tin cans, while behind them, with
infinite clatter, came three lengths of stove-pipe from the bakery
chimney, closely pursued by an immense barrel which had once contained
crockery.

As though enjoying the fun, this barrel came bounding down the roadway,
making astonishing leaps, until, at the grocery corner, it encountered
the only one of the empty boxes which had not already gone south, and
glancing off at an angle, went bang through the show window!

It was as though My Lord, the North Wind, aware of Mr. Jackson's
incredulity, had sent an emissary to convince him that he _did_ intend
to blow that day.

From that moment the wind and the snow had it all their own way; not a
citizen dared to show his nose outside.

It was an uneasy day for Uncle Tom. Knowing full well the extreme danger
of being caught on the mountain in such a storm, he could not help
feeling anxious for our safety, and though his host tried to reassure
him by repeating his confidence in Dick Stanley's good sense and
experience, he grew more and more fidgety as the day wore on and
darkness began to settle down upon the town.

In fact, by sunset, Uncle Tom had worked himself up to a high state of
nervousness. He kept pacing up and down the room like a caged beast,
unconsciously puffing at a cigar which had gone out half an hour before;
then striding to the window to look out--a disheartening prospect, for
not even the corner grocery was visible now. Then back he would come,
plump himself into his chair before the fire, only to jump up again in
fifteen seconds to go through the same performance once more.

At length he flung his cigar-stump into the fire, and turning to his
friend, exclaimed:

"Sam, I can't stand this uncertainty any longer. I'm going out to see if
I can't find somebody who will undertake to go up to the professor's
house and back for twenty dollars, just to make sure those boys have got
safe home. I'd go myself, only I know I should never get there."

The assayer shook his head.

"No use, Tom," said he. "You couldn't get one to go; at least, not for
money. If it were to dig a friend out of the snow you could raise a
hundred men in a minute; but for money--no. I don't believe you could
get any of them to face this storm for twenty dollars--or fifty, either.
They would say, 'What's the use? If the boys are in, they're in; if
they're not----'"

"Well, if they're not---- What? I know what you mean. You chill me all
through, Sam, with your 'ifs.' Look here, old man, isn't there _anybody_
who would go? Think, man, think!"

"We might try little Aleck Smith, the teamster," said the assayer,
thoughtfully. "He's as tough as a bit of bailing-wire and plum full of
grit. We'll try him anyhow. Come on. I'll go with you. It's only six
houses down. Jump into your overcoat, old man!"

The two men turned to get their coats, when, at that moment, there came
a thump upon the porch outside, as though somebody had jumped up the two
steps at a bound, the door burst open and in the midst of a whirl of
snow there was blown into the room the muffled, snow-coated figure of a
boy, who, slamming the door behind him, leaned back against it, gasping
for breath.

The men stared in astonishment, until the boy, pulling off his cap,
revealed the face, scarlet from exposure, of Dick Stanley.

"Why, Dick!" cried the assayer. "What's the matter? Where's young
Frank?"

"All safe, sir! Safe in our house, and in bed and asleep by this time."

"And did you come down through this howling storm to tell me?" cried
Uncle Tom.

"Yes, sir. But that wasn't anything so very much, you know: it was
down-hill and downwind, too."

"Well, you may think what you like about it--but so may I, too; and my
opinion is that there isn't another boy in the country would have done
it. I shan't forget your service, Dick. You may count on that. I shan't
forget it!"

Nor did he--as you will see.




CHAPTER VI

THE PROFESSOR'S STORY


What a change had come over the landscape when, at sunrise next morning,
I jumped out of bed and went to the door to look out. Though the sky was
as clear and as blue as ever, though Mescalero, swept bare by the wind,
looked much as usual, all the lower parts of the range, except the
crowns of the ridges, were buried under the snow. The woods were full of
it; every hollow was leveled off so that one could hardly tell where it
used to be; while the narrow valley itself was ridged and furrowed by
great drifts piled up by freaks of the wind. It was cold, too, for with
the falling of the wind and the clearing of the sky the temperature had
dropped to zero. As so often happens in these parts, winter had arrived
with a bang.

Closing the door, I hopped back to the jolly, roaring fire of logs which
Romero had started an hour before, and there finished my dressing. While
I was thus engaged, the professor came out of the back room, where it
was his custom to sleep--a queer choice--with a couple of thousand dead
insects for company.

"Well, Frank," said he, cheerily. "Here's King Winter in all his glory.
Rather a rough-and-tumble monarch, isn't he? When his majesty makes his
royal progress, we, his humble subjects, do well to get out of his way
and leave the course clear for him."

"That's true, sir," said I, laughing; and falling into the professor's
humor, I added: "I never met a king before, and if King Winter is an
example of the race I think we Americans were wise to get rid of them
when we did."

"Oh," replied the professor, "you must not judge a whole order by one
specimen: there are kings and kings, and some of them are very fine
fellows. King Winter, though, is rather too boisterous and
inconsiderate; and to tell you the truth, Frank, you had rather a narrow
escape from him yesterday. I did not like to make too much of it before
Dick; I did not want him to think I blamed him for what was, after all,
merely an oversight; but as a matter of fact you ran a pretty big risk,
as you may easily understand when you see the amount of snow that fell
in about twelve hours; for the storm ceased and the sky cleared again
about three o'clock this morning."

"It was nip and tuck for us, sure enough," said I; "but if our getting
caught in the storm was any fault of Dick's, there is one thing certain,
sir: he got us out of it in great style. I wouldn't ask for a better
guide. I was pretty badly scared myself, I don't mind owning"--the
professor nodded, as much as to say, "I don't wonder,"--"but Dick," I
continued, "did not seem to be flustered for a moment; he knew just what
to do and pitched right in and did it. It seems to me, sir--though of
course I don't set up to be a judge--that the most experienced
mountaineer couldn't have done any better."

"Dick is a good boy," said the professor, evidently pleased at my
standing up for his young friend; "and he seems to have a faculty for
keeping his wits about him in an emergency. It has always been so, ever
since he was a little boy. I suppose he has never told you, has he, how
he once saved his donkey from a mountain-lion?"

"No, sir," I replied. "How was it?"

"He was about nine years old at the time, and as his little legs were
too short to enable him to keep up with me, I had given him a young
burro to ride. We were camped one night on the Trinchera, not far from
Fort Garland, when we were awakened by a great squealing on the part of
the donkey, which was tethered a few feet away, and sitting up in our
beds, which were on the ground under the open sky, we were just in time
to see some big, cat-like animal spring upon the poor little beast and
knock it over. Instead of crying and crawling under the blankets, as he
might well have been excused for doing, little Dick sprang out of his
bed--as did I also. But the youngster was twice as quick as I was, and
without an instant's hesitation he seized a burning stick from the fire,
ran right up to the mountain-lion--for that was what it was--and as the
snarling creature raised its head, the plucky little chap thrust the hot
end of his stick into its mouth, when, with a yell of pain and
astonishment, the beast let go its hold and fled like a yellow streak
into the woods again."

"Bully for Dick!" I cried. "That was pretty good, wasn't it? And was the
donkey killed?"

"No; rather badly scratched; but Dick's promptness and courage saved it
from anything more serious."

"Well, that was certainly pretty good for such a youngster," said I.
"By the way, sir," I continued, "there is one thing I should like to ask
you, if you don't mind, about your life in the mountains, especially
back in the 'sixties' and earlier, and that is, how you managed to
escape being killed and scalped by the Indians."

My host laughed, and I could see by his face that he was thinking
backward, as he slowly stirred his coffee round and round; for we were
seated at our breakfast, Romero serving us.

"That _was_ a serious question at first," he replied presently, "but I
solved it very early in my wanderings; and now I--and Dick, too--may go
among any of the tribes with impunity."

"Will you tell me about it, sir?" I asked, full of curiosity to know how
he had worked such a seeming miracle.

The professor leaned back in his chair, stretched out his feet and
folded his hands on the edge of the table.

"I will, with pleasure," he replied; "for it is rather a curious
incident, I have always thought.

"Before I took up the profession of 'bug-hunting,' as the pursuit of
entomology is irreverently termed by the people here, I had graduated as
a physician--very fortunately for me, as it turned out, for my
knowledge of medicine was the basis of my reputation among the Indians.
I was down in Arizona at one time, when, on coming to a little Mexican
village, I found the poor people suffering from an epidemic of smallpox.
Several had died, and the survivors, scared out of their wits, had given
themselves up for lost. After my arrival, however, there were no more
deaths, I am glad to say, and by the end of about a month I had
succeeded in putting all my patients on the highroad to recovery.

"There was a little adobe ranch-house about a quarter of a mile
up-stream from the village, the owner of which had died before my
arrival, and this building I had utilized as a pest-house. I was on my
way out to it one morning, with my little case of medicines in my hand,
when I heard behind me a great crying out among the villagers, and
looking back I saw them all scuttling for shelter, at the same time
shouting and screaming, according to their age and sex, 'Apache!
Apache!'

"The next moment, right through the middle of the village, riding like a
whirlwind, came ten horsemen, who, paying no attention to the frightened
Mexicans, made straight for me. Doubtless they had been hiding in the
creek-bed among the willows since daylight, awaiting their opportunity
to dash out and capture me--for, as I found later, it was I whom they
were after.

"To run was useless, to fight impossible, as I was unarmed, so, there
being nothing else to do, I just stood still and waited for them. In a
moment I was surrounded, when one of the Indians sprang from his horse
and advanced upon me. He had, as I very well remember, his nose painted
a bright green--a fearsome object. This apparition came striding toward
me, and I supposed I was to be killed and scalped forthwith; but
instead, my friend of the green nose, in halting Spanish, and with a
deference which was as welcome as it was unexpected, explained to me
that the fame of the great white medicine-man had extended far and wide;
that the smallpox was ravaging their village; and that they had come to
beg me to return with them and drive out the enemy.

"Greatly relieved to find that their mission was peaceful, I replied at
once that I would come with pleasure, provided I were treated with the
respect due to my quality, but that I must first visit the pest-house
and leave directions for the care of my two remaining patients. To
this--rather to my surprise--they readily consented, relying implicitly
upon my promise to accompany them; an instance of trustfulness from
which I could only infer, I regret to say, that they had had but little
intercourse with white men.

"The Indians had brought a horse for me, and after a long two-days' ride
into the mountains, we reached the camp, consisting of about twenty
lodges, where I found matters in pretty bad condition. I went to work
vigorously, however, and again had the good fortune to rout the enemy
without the loss of a patient; thereby, as you may suppose, gaining the
lasting good will of every member of the tribe--with one exception.

"This exception--rather an important one--was the local medicine-man,
who, having vainly endeavored to drive out the plague by the application
of bad smells and worse noises, was not unnaturally consumed with
jealousy of my superior success, and with the desire to discover what
charms and spells I used to that end.

"On our way up from the Mexican settlement I had several times stopped
to note the direction with a little pocket-compass I always carried
about with me, on each of which occasions I had observed that the
medicine-man, who was one of the party, had eyed the little instrument
with a sort of fearful curiosity. Later, when my patients were all
getting well, I had several times gone out to a distance from the camp
and with the compass taken the bearings of the many mountain peaks
visible in all directions, making a little map of the country. Every
time I did this, the medicine-man was sure to come stalking by, watching
my motions out of the corner of his eye. On one such occasion I called
him to me, anxious to be on friendly terms, and showing him the
instrument, tried to explain its use. But the Indian, seeing through the
glass the unaccountable motion of the needle, was afraid to touch it,
and my explanation, I fear, had rather the effect of misleading him, for
his knowledge of Spanish was very small, while my knowledge of Apache
was smaller, and eventually he went off with the idea that the compass,
which I had tried to make him understand was my 'guide,' 'director' and
so forth, was in fact nothing more nor less than the familiar spirit
through whose aid I had ousted the evil spirit of the smallpox.

"With this conviction in his mind, and supposing that the possession of
the compass would confer upon him similar powers, he screwed up his
courage to steal it--and a very courageous act it was, too, I consider,
remembering how greatly he stood in fear of it.

"It was on the eve of my departure that I discovered my loss, and going
straight to my friend with the green nose I informed him of the fact, at
the same time stating my conviction that the medicine-man was the thief.
He was very wroth that his guest should have been so treated after
having rendered such good service to the community, but feeling some
diffidence about seizing and searching his medicine-man, of whom he was
rather afraid, he suggested that I concoct a spell which should induce
the thief to disgorge his plunder of his own accord; a course which
would doubtless be a simple matter to a high-class magician like myself.

"This was rather embarrassing. I did not at all like to trust to the
tricks of the charlatan, but being unable to devise any other plan by
which to recover my compass, an instrument indispensable to me, and
impossible to replace, in that wild country, I determined to employ a
device I had once read of as having been adopted by an officer in the
East India Company's service to detect a thieving Sepoy soldier. Even
then I should not have resorted to such a measure had I not felt
convinced that the medicine-man was the thief, and that his
superstitious dread of my powers would cause him to fall into my trap.

"I therefore desired Green Nose to summon all the men of the village,
which being done, I addressed them through him as interpreter. I told
them that one of their number was a thief, and that I was about to find
out which one it was--a statement which I could see had an impressive
effect.

"Taking two straws of wild rye, I cut them to exactly equal lengths, and
then, holding them up so that all might see, I announced that the men
were to come forward, one at a time, take one of the straws, step inside
my lodge for a few seconds, and then bring back the straw to me. To
those who were innocent nothing would happen, 'but,' said I, with
menacing fore-finger, 'when the _thief_ brings back the straw it will be
found to have _grown one inch_!'

"I waited a minute to allow this announcement to have its full effect,
and then requested that, in deference to his exalted position, my
honored brother, the medicine-man, should be the first to test the
potency of my magic.

"I could see that he was very reluctant to do any such thing, but to
decline would be to draw suspicion on himself, so, stepping from the
line, he received the straw and retired with it to my lodge.

"There was a minute of breathless suspense, when back he came and handed
over his straw to me. My own straw, together with the hand which held
it, I had covered with a large, spotted silk handkerchief, in such a
manner that it was concealed from view, and slipping the medicine-man's
straw into the same hand, I perceived at once that the thief had
betrayed himself, just as I had hoped and expected he would.

"Casting a glance along the line of silent Indians, and noting that they
were all attention, I withdrew the handkerchief and held up the two
straws. One of them was an inch longer than the other!

"In spite of their habitual stoicism, there was a murmur and a stir
along the line; but the greatest effect was naturally upon the poor
medicine-man. Thrusting his hand into his bosom, he drew out the compass
from under his shirt, handed it to me, and then, pulling his blanket
over his head, he crept away without a word and shut himself up in his
lodge."

"But how did you do it?" I interrupted. "How did his straw come out
longer than the other? Did you break off a piece from your own?"

"No," replied the professor, smiling; "it was the medicine-man who broke
off a piece from his. Knowing himself to be the thief, and fully
believing that the straw would grow in his hand, he no sooner got into
the shelter of my lodge than he bit off an inch from his straw, thus
making sure, as he supposed, that its supernatural growth would bring it
back to its original length. It was just what I had expected him to do.
Nobody but myself, of course, could tell which straw was which, and when
I held them up to view, one longer than the other, the whole assembly
never doubted for an instant that the shorter one was mine and that it
was the thief's straw that had grown--least of all the medicine-man,
himself.

"He, poor fellow, conscious of guilt, and being himself a dealer in
charms and incantations, was more than anybody in a proper frame of mind
to put faith in my magic, and when he saw, as he supposed, that his
straw, in spite of his precautions, had grown the promised inch, he
collapsed at once; and thinking, very likely, that it was the compass
itself that had betrayed him, he handed it back to me very willingly,
glad to be rid of so pernicious a little imp."

"And was that the end of the matter?" I asked.

"Yes, that was the end of it. Being all ready to go, I went, leaving
behind me a reputation which was to be of great service to me on many a
subsequent occasion; a reputation due, I am sorry to say, very much more
to the clap-trap trick played upon the poor medicine-man than upon my
really meritorious service in dealing with the smallpox epidemic. My
fame gradually extended among all the mountain tribes, and since then I
have been free to go anywhere with the assurance not only of safety but
of welcome from any of the Indians, Apache, Ute or Navajo--a condition
of affairs which, as you will readily understand has been of infinite
service to me during my twenty years of wandering.

"Ah!" casting a glance out of the window as he rose from the table.
"Here comes Dick, and somebody with him; a stranger to me--your uncle, I
presume."




CHAPTER VII

DICK'S DIPLOMACY


Running to the door, I saw Dick striding down toward the cabin, while
behind him on a stout pony rode Uncle Tom. Just as I stepped out, the
pair approached one of the drifts of snow which ridged the valley, and
into this Dick plunged at once. Though it was up to his waist, he pretty
soon forced his way through, when it was Uncle Tom's turn.

Evidently it was not the first time the pony had tackled a snow-drift,
for he showed no disposition to shirk the task, but wading in up to his
knees, he did the rest of the passage in a series of short leaps, very
like buck-jumping; a mode of progression extremely discomforting to his
plump, short-legged rider.

"Oh! Ah!" gasped Uncle Tom at each jump. "Heavens! What a country! Dick,
you imp of darkness, I thought you said it was an easy trail."

At this I could not help laughing, when Uncle Tom, who had not
perceived me before, transferred his attention to me.

"You young scamp, Frank!" cried he, shaking his fist at me as I ran
forward to meet him. "This is a nice way to treat your respected
uncle--first scare him half to death and then laugh at him. Lucky for me
there's only one of you: if you had been born twins I should have been
worn to a rag long ago. How are you, old fellow?" he went on, reaching
down to shake hands with me. "Any the worse for your adventure?"

"Not a bit," I replied. "Sound as a bell, thank you."

"Thank Dick, you mean. I'll tell you what, Frank," he continued, leaning
down and whispering; Dick having walked on toward the house: "that's an
uncommonly fine young fellow, in my opinion. His coming down in the
storm last night to tell me that you were all safe was a thing that few
boys of his age would have done and fewer still would have thought of
doing. Ah! This is the professor, I suppose. Why, I've seen him before!"

So saying, Uncle Tom jumped to the ground, and hastening forward, held
out his hand, exclaiming:

"How are you, Herr Bergen? I'm glad to meet you again. We are old
acquaintances, though I had forgotten your name, if I ever heard it."

"I believe you are right, Mr. Allen," responded the professor. "Your
face seems familiar, though I am ashamed to say I cannot recall when or
where we met."

"I can remind you," said Uncle Tom. "It was at Fort Garland, six or
seven years ago. I was on my way to investigate an alleged gold
discovery in the Taos mountains, when you rode into the fort to ask the
cavalry vet to give you something to dress the wounds of a burro which
had been clawed by a mountain-lion. I got into conversation with you,
and learning that you also wanted some cartridges for a little Ballard
rifle, I gave you a box of fifty. Do you remember?"

"I remember very well," replied the professor. "The cartridges were for
Dick: he learned to shoot with a Ballard. Well, this is a great pleasure
to meet an old acquaintance like this. Come in out of the cold. Romero
will take your pony."

Soon we were all seated before the fire, Uncle Tom puffing away his
aches and pains with the smoke of the inevitable cigar, when the
professor, turning to him, asked:

"And how long do you intend to stay in camp, Mr. Allen? Will this snow
drive you out?"

"Not at all," replied Uncle Tom. "I expect to be here a couple of weeks,
in spite of the snow. The drifts will settle in a day or two, and the
miners will break trails to their claims, and then I shall be able to
get about--there won't be any difficulty. Though if it were going to be
as hard work as it was coming up here this morning I might as well go
home again at once--it took us an hour to make the one mile from town."

"You came to inspect the mines, I understand. Do you confine yourself to
silver mines, or do you deal in mines of all sorts?"

"Silver and gold," replied Uncle Tom. "Though, as it happens, I am on
the lookout this time for a copper mine as well. Before I left St. Louis
I notified a Boston firm, with whom I have frequent dealings, of my
intention to come here, and received from them in reply a telegram,
saying, 'Find us a good copper mine. Price no object.' There was no
explanation, and I am rather puzzled to understand why they should
suddenly branch out into 'coppers' in this way."

"I expect the explanation is simple enough," remarked the professor.

"What is it, then?" asked Uncle Tom.

"To any one watching the progress of science," replied the professor,
puffing away at his big porcelain pipe, "even to me, here on the ragged
edge of civilization, it is obvious that a new era is close at hand; a
new force rapidly coming to the front."

"Electricity?" asked Uncle Tom.

"Yes, electricity. The science is still in the egg, as you may say, but
to those who have ears to hear, the shell is beginning to crack. I am
convinced that before long we shall be lighting our streets with
electricity and using it in a thousand ways as a mechanical power. The
consequence will be an immense increase in the demand for copper; and
that, I have no doubt, is why you have been asked to look out for a
copper mine: they want to be ready when the time comes. What is this,
Dick?"

At the first mention of the words, "copper mine," the thoughts of Dick
and myself had, of course, instantly reverted to the King Philip mine,
and I was on the point of introducing the subject, when Dick, catching
my eye, signed to me to keep quiet. Rising from his chair, he stepped
softly to the rack where the rifles hung and took down the Mexican's
arrow, which he had put there the evening before. It happened that we
had not mentioned the episode of the wolves and the Mexican when
describing to the professor our struggle homeward through the
snow-storm, and consequently, when my companion laid the arrow on the
table close to his elbow, it was only natural that the old gentleman
should exclaim, "What is this, Dick?"

Very briefly, Dick related how he had come by it, merely stating that we
had seen a Mexican shoot a wolf; that the Mexican had run away when we
hailed him; and that we had gone and picked up his arrow. I wondered
rather why he did not call attention to the copper arrow-head; but Dick
knew what he was about, as I very soon saw: he intended to let the
professor discover it for himself, which a man of his habits of close
observation was certain to do. In fact, the old gentleman had no sooner
taken the arrow into his hands than he exclaimed:

"Why, this arrow-head is made of copper! A Mexican, you say? Then he
probably came from Hermanos. You remember, Dick, how all the people
down there---- Why, Mr. Allen, here's the very thing! You want a copper
mine? Well, here is a copper mine all ready to your hand! All you have
to do is----"

"To find it," interjected Dick, laughing.

"That is true," the professor assented, laughing himself. "I had
forgotten that little particular for the moment, Dick. I'm afraid it is
not quite so ready to your hand as I was leading you to suppose, Mr.
Allen; but that it is there, somewhere in the Dos Hermanos mountains, I
feel sure."

Thereupon the professor proceeded to tell the story that Dick had
already told me, giving some further details of the information he had
derived from the Spanish gentleman, Don Blake.

"It appears to have been a mine of some consequence," said the
professor. "The records covered a period of fifteen years, and during
the last five years of the time the shipments were constant and large.
It is fairly sure, I think, that the product was native copper----"

"Sure to be," interrupted Uncle Tom. "It would never have paid to ship
any waste product so far. In fact, I am surprised that they should ship
even native copper such a long distance."

"Yes; but as they did so, I think the inference is that the metal was
plentiful and easy to mine."

"That is a reasonable assumption," said Uncle Tom, thoughtfully nodding
his head. "What beats me, though," he went on, "is that the memory of
the spot should have been so totally lost. Considering that the mine was
producing for fifteen years, there must be many traces of the work done,
such as the waste dump, the old road or trail, and so forth: you can't
run a mine for that length of time and leave no marks. It is a wonder to
me that the place has never been rediscovered."

"I don't think there is anything surprising in that," replied the
professor. "The villagers of Hermanos, agricultural people, seldom go
five miles from home; it is only old Galvez' _vaqueros_, his cow-men,
who would be likely to come across the traces of mining, and if they
did, those peons are such incurious, unenterprising people they would
pay no attention. Besides which, I gathered that even the cow-men never
went up into the Dos Hermanos mountains: it is not a good cattle
country--rough granite and limestone, little water and scant pasturage.
Consequently, the cattle range southward toward the Santa Claras,
instead of westward to the Dos Hermanos, and the Twin Peaks, therefore,
remain in their solitary glory, untouched by the foot of man; and
probably they have so remained ever since the King Philip mine was
abandoned, a hundred and fifty years ago."

For a full minute Uncle Tom remained silent, thoughtfully blowing out
long spirals of cigar smoke, but presently he roused up again and said:

"There is one thing more I should like to ask you, Professor, and that
is, why you conclude that the King Philip mine is in the Dos Hermanos
mountains?"

"For this reason," replied our friend: "In the first place, many of the
reports were dated from the _Casa del Rey_. Of course, it is likely
enough that there are other _Casas del Rey_ in other parts of the
country, but besides the frequent mention of the King's House, there was
also mention of Indian fights at different places: 'at the crossing of
the Perdita,' for instance, and 'near the spring by Picture Buttes';
then there was the record of a snow-blockade on the Mosca Pass, in the
Santa Claras; another of a terrible dust-storm on the Little Cactus
Desert, 'with the loss of one man and three mules'; and so forth. Now, a
line running through these and other places mentioned would bring you
into the Mescalero valley at its southern end, and there is no doubt in
my mind that the _Casa del Rey_ named in the reports is the King's House
down there at Hermanos."

"It does seem so, doesn't it?" responded Uncle Tom. "Look here,
professor," he went on, suddenly jumping out of his chair and casting
his cigar stump into the fire, "I must make an attempt to find that
copper mine. It does, as you say, seem all ready to my hand. But how to
do it, is the question. I can't go myself--can't spare the time--so the
only way, I suppose, is to hire some prospector, if I can."

"I don't think you can get one," said the professor, shaking his head;
"at least, not here in Mosby. They are all too intent on hunting for
silver, and I doubt if you could persuade one of them to waste a season
in searching for a metal so commonplace as copper, the value of which is
rather prospective than immediate. I doubt very much if you could get
one to go."

"I suppose not," replied Uncle Tom. "And you can hardly blame them,
either, when you consider that by the expenditure of the same amount of
labor a man may come across a rich vein of silver, every ounce of which
he knows to be worth a dollar and twenty cents."

"Just so," the professor assented.

"What am I to do, then?" asked Uncle Tom. "Give it up? Seems a pity,
doesn't it, when, more than likely, the old workings are lying there
plain to view, only waiting for some one with his eyes open to pass that
way. Still, if I can't get a man----"

"Take a boy," suggested Dick, cutting in unexpectedly.

Uncle Tom whirled round on his heels and stared at him; the professor
removed his long pipe from his mouth and stared at him too; while Dick
himself sat bolt upright in his chair, a broad and genial grin
overspreading his countenance.

For some seconds they all maintained these attitudes in silence, when
Uncle Tom suddenly broke into a hearty laugh.

"You young scamp!" cried he, shaking his forefinger at Dick. "I believe
that's what you've been aiming at all the time."

"That's just what we have, Mr. Allen," replied my companion. "Frank and
I were talking about it yesterday, saying what fun it would be to go and
hunt for the old mine; though we never expected to get the chance. But
when you began to talk about copper mines, we cocked our ears, of
course, thinking that here, perhaps, _was_ a chance after all--and--and
if you _can't_ get a man, Mr. Allen, why not send a boy? Would you let
me go, Professor?"

Our two elders looked at each other, and very anxiously we looked at our
two elders. Not a word did either of them say, until the professor,
rising from his chair and knocking out the ashes of his pipe upon the
hearthstone, remarked quietly:

"Go out and chop some wood, boys. I want to talk to Mr. Allen."

Regarding this order as a hopeful sign, out we went, and for a long
half-hour we feverishly hacked at the heap of poles outside, making a
rather indifferent job of it, I suspect, until a tapping at the window
attracted our attention and we saw Uncle Tom beckoning us to come in.

How anxiously we scanned their countenances this time, any one will
guess. Both men were standing with their backs to the fire, Uncle Tom
smoking a fresh cigar and the professor puffing away again at his pipe,
both of them looking so solemn that I thought to myself, "It's no go,"
and my spirits fell accordingly; but looking again at Uncle Tom I
detected a twitching at the corner of his mouth which sent them up again
with a bound.

"Well, Uncle Tom!" I cried. "What's it to be?"

"It is a serious matter," replied my guardian, with all the solemnity of
a judge passing sentence. "The professor and I have discussed it very
earnestly, and we have decided--that you shall go!"




CHAPTER VIII

THE START


The delight with which this announcement was received by us two boys may
be imagined, for though we had hoped for such a decision we had not
dared to expect it. I, for my part, had feared that the matter of my
interrupted education alone would form an insurmountable barrier; and
indeed it was that subject which had proved the chief obstacle, as Uncle
Tom presently informed me. All the other objections were minor ones and
we discreetly refrained from asking for their recapitulation lest, in
going over them again, something not thought of before should crop up to
interfere. We were quite content to accept the decision without knowing
how it had been arrived at.

As to my interrupted schooling, though, that was a serious matter, as
Uncle Tom, in spite of his original ideas about education, clearly
understood.

"The main question with me, you see, Frank," said he, "was whether you
would benefit or otherwise by missing so much schooling, and though I
believe pretty strongly in the value of learning by practice and
experience, I should have felt obliged to decide against this expedition
if the professor had not come to the rescue. It is to him you owe our
decision to let you boys go."

I looked gratefully at Herr Bergen, who serenely waved the stem of his
pipe in our direction, though whether to intimate that the obligation
was nothing to speak of, or as a sign to Uncle Tom to go on, I could not
decide.

"I find," continued the latter, "that the winter is Dick's school-time;
and the professor has offered to take you in, Frank, and let you share
in Dick's work, undertaking to bring you on in your mathematics in
particular--which is your weak spot, you know. In the spring, when the
snow clears off, you are to start for the Dos Hermanos and make a
thorough search for this old copper mine; and as you will be doing it on
my account, I shall bear all expenses. There, that is all, except--well,
it is not necessary to mention that--but I was going to say that I rely
on you, old fellow, to make the most of your opportunity and in your own
person to prove the correctness of my theory that a boy may sometimes
learn more out of school than in it."

"I believe you may count on me, Uncle Tom," said I. "I'll do my level
best. And I'm tremendously obliged to you, Herr Bergen----"

"Not at all," interrupted the professor, "not at all. The fact is, I am
very glad to have a companion for Dick; and as to the schooling, the
obligation is not all on one side by any means, for to me it is one of
the greatest pleasures possible to teach a boy who really desires to
learn. I anticipate a most pleasant winter."

Thus was this odd arrangement made by which I, who by right should have
been attending a public school in St. Louis, became the private pupil of
an eminent German professor, pursuing my studies in a little log cabin
tucked away in a snow-encumbered valley of the Rocky Mountains--about as
queer a piece of topsyturviness, to my notion, as ever happened to a
boy, and one very unlikely to happen to any other boy, unless he chanced
to be endowed with an Uncle Tom cut out on the same pattern as mine.

"There's one thing, Frank," said my guardian, as we made our way down to
camp later in the day, "there's one thing I didn't mention in Dick's
presence, and that is that the professor laid great stress on the
pleasure and advantage it would be to Dick to have a companion of his
own age for once, and it was that which turned the balance with
me--after the educational question had been got out of the way. For I
owe Dick a good turn if I can do him one without hurting anybody else; I
told him I wouldn't forget his service in coming down through the storm
yesterday, and I haven't forgotten. I'm uncommonly glad to think that in
consenting to your taking part in this expedition--which I believe will
be a great thing for you, mentally as well as bodily--we shall be doing
a service to Dick and to the old professor at the same time."

"Well, Uncle Tom," said I, "you may be sure I am glad enough to stay,
and I hope it will not only prove a good thing for Dick and me, but for
you as well."

"I hope so, too. And it will, if you can locate that old copper mine,
and if it should prove to be anywhere near as good as it sounds."

As things turned out, I was destined to begin my winter's schooling
somewhat earlier than we had expected, for, five days after the storm,
Uncle Tom received from his Boston employers a telegram, forwarded by
mail from the end of the line, saying, "Come here at once. Important,"
when, without demur, he forthwith packed up his things and away he went;
while I, taking leave of our kind host, the assayer, moved up to Herr
Bergen's house.

I need not go into the details of our daily life on Mosby Creek; it is
enough to say that the winter was one of the pleasantest I had ever
spent. Time flew by, as was only natural, for there was not an idle
moment for either of us. Herr Bergen proved to be a most able
instructor, not only in the matter of scholarship but in general
training as well. He had served in the German army in his younger days,
and the habits of orderliness, precision and promptness remained with
him. We boys were made to toe the mark, and no mistake; there was a time
for work and a time for play, and whether for duty or pleasure, we had
to be on hand to the minute.

I do not wish to imply that the professor was harsh, or anything of the
sort; very far from it: he was most considerate of our shortcomings,
which were doubtless plentiful enough, and with infinite patience would
go over the ground again and again whenever Dick or I got ourselves
tangled up; a condition of things which happened on the average about
once a day to each of us. Then, every marked advance we made in any of
our studies was so obviously gratifying to the kindly old gentleman that
that fact alone was enough to spur a fellow on to doing his extra-best.
As a consequence, I, for my part, made very notable progress, and it was
with great pleasure, as you may suppose, that I was able later on to
write to Uncle Tom my conviction that I had gained rather than lost by
my winter's work.

One thing, at least, which I should not have acquired in school, I
gained by my association with the professor's household: I learned to
speak Spanish. Herr Bergen made a great point of it that I should do so,
as it would be pretty sure to come in useful during the ensuing summer.
He and Dick--and Romero, of course--all spoke it very well, so that my
opportunity for picking it up was excellent, and I made rapid progress;
my knowledge of Latin, which, though very far from profound, was up to
the average of a schoolboy of my age, being an immense help.

All this time we did not lack exercise--the professor was just as
particular about that as he was about our work--and Dick and I had many
a jolly outing on our snow-shoes, the management of which was another
thing I learned. I should not omit to mention also that I spent a good
deal of time and a liberal number of cartridges practising with a rifle,
thereby becoming a very fair shot; though, of course, I could not
compete with Dick, who, having learned as a mere child, seemed, almost,
to shoot straight by nature.

The weather on the average was splendid that winter, and there were but
few days when we could not get out. Four or five times, perhaps, during
the months I spent in the valley a snow-storm came raging down on us,
shutting us up for a day or two, after which the jovial sun would turn
up smiling again just as though nothing had happened.

It was toward the end of April that Dick and I began to get ready to
leave. The increasing power of the sun had cleared off all the snow
below eleven thousand feet, the green grass was beginning to show in
many places, and it was fair to suppose that by the time we reached the
Dos Hermanos we should find pasturage enough for our animals--two ponies
and a mule.

Dick already had his own pony, while the mule, a tough little beast by
name Uncle Fritz, was provided by the professor, both animals having
passed the winter on a ranch about a couple of thousand feet lower down.
Before he left, Uncle Tom had suggested hiring them for the season, but
the professor would not consent to his paying anything, saying that the
animals might just as well be put to some use as to waste their time
doing nothing all summer. Consequently, about the only expense to which
my guardian was put, besides furnishing provisions and tools for the
expedition, was the purchase of a pony and a rifle for me. This was a
very moderate outlay, and I was glad to think that Uncle Tom would get
off so cheaply, if our search should turn out a failure; and no one was
more ready to recognize that possibility--probability, I should rather
say, perhaps--than Uncle Tom himself, to whom the many stories in
general circulation of lost Spanish mines of fabulous richness were
familiar, and who knew very well how little foundation there was for
most of them. The present case, though, was different from the
generality, in that there existed documentary evidence that there had
been such a mine; a fact which altered the conditions entirely. For it
is safe to say that without such documentary evidence Uncle Tom would
never have consented to our undertaking such an enterprise, and Dick and
I, in consequence, would never have run into the series of adventures
which were destined to befall us before we were many weeks older.

It was on the first day of May that we at last took leave of our good
friend, Herr Bergen, and rode off down the valley, passing on our way
through the town of Mosby, where our appearance on horseback, driving
our pack-mule before us, excited among the citizens much speculation as
to our destination; a matter concerning which we had said not a word to
anybody. That it was a prospecting expedition any one could see, for the
pick and shovel could not very well be concealed, but where we were
bound for nobody knew, Uncle Tom having cautioned us that if we let a
word escape about an old Spanish mine we should have a hundred men at
our heels in no time; the very idea of such a thing having an
irresistible fascination for some people, especially for the
inexperienced newcomer.

[Illustration: "PASSING ON OUR WAY THROUGH THE TOWN OF MOSBY."]

Our reason for taking our way through town rather than crossing the
Mosby Ridge, back of the professor's house, and going down the
Mescalero valley, was that the latter course, cut up by many deep
cañons, would be much the more difficult of the two; for by following
down the eastern side of the ridge, as we proposed to do, we should
presently come to a point where that barrier, which up near Mescalero
began as a mountain range, became first a line of round-topped hills,
and then, about forty miles below town, came to an end altogether in a
little conical eminence known as The Foolscap. We could therefore pass
round its southern end without difficulty, when we should find ourselves
in the Mescalero valley at its wide part, and by heading southwestward
should arrive in about another twenty miles in the neighborhood of the
village of Hermanos--a route somewhat longer, but very much easier for
the animals, than the other one.

About five miles below town we abandoned the road, which there turned
off to the left to join the main stage-road, and continuing our
southward course up and down hill over the spurs of the Mosby Ridge we
made camp early in the afternoon; for our animals being as yet in rather
poor condition, we thought it advisable to give them an easy day for the
first one.

Selecting a sheltered nook among the pine trees, we unpacked the mule
and unsaddled the ponies, and then, while Dick cooked our supper, I
busied myself cutting pine boughs for our beds and chopping fire-wood.
Soon after sunset we rolled ourselves in our blankets, and in spite of
the novelty of the situation--for I had never before gone to bed with no
roof overhead nearer than the sky--I slept soundly until Dick's voice
aroused me, crying, "Roll out, old chap! Roll out! The sun will catch
you in bed in a minute," when I sprang up, fresh as a daisy and hungry
as a shark, as one always seems to do after sleeping out under the stars
in the keen, pine-scented air of the mountains.

Continuing our journey, we presently rounded the end of the Mosby Ridge,
and turning to the right saw before us the twin peaks of the Dos
Hermanos, standing there, as it seemed to me, like two faithful
sentinels guarding the secret of the King Philip mine.

"Now, Frank," said my companion, as we sat at supper on the little hill
with which the Ridge terminated, "we have a tough day of it before us
to-morrow. The valley down at this end, you see, is just a sage-brush
plain; there are no cañons down here like there are at the upper end;
and there is no water either, unfortunately--this side of the
mountains, I mean. The streams which come down from Mescalero and the
Ridge take a westerly turn and go off through a deep gorge to the north
of the peaks--you can see the black shadow of it from here."

"What do the people at Hermanos do for water, then?" I asked.

"There is a little stream which comes down from the saddle between the
Dos Hermanos peaks and runs eastward through the village. But it sinks
into the soil soon afterward, for the country down that way becomes very
sandy; it is the beginning of the Little Cactus Desert, across which the
pack-trains and the soldier escort used to travel, you remember, headed
for the Mosca Pass--that low place in the Santa Claras that you see down
there, due south from here."

"I see. So the nearest water is the stream running through the village.
Do you propose, then, to make for Hermanos?"

"No, I don't," replied Dick. "We want to avoid the village, if possible:
it is no use exciting the curiosity of old Galvez, if he happens to be
there. What I propose is that we make straight from here to the north
side of the peaks, leaving the village three or four miles on our left;
find a good camping-place, and make it a base for our preliminary
operations."

"That's all right," I assented. "But how much of a day's ride will it be
to the north side of the peaks? Further than to Hermanos, I suppose, and
that is over twenty miles."

"Yes," replied Dick, "twenty-five miles certainly and perhaps thirty--a
long stretch without water. But we can do it all right. I propose that
we get off by four in the morning, which ought to bring us to the
foothills of the Dos Hermanos by two or three o'clock in the afternoon."

"That's a good idea," I responded. "And if, by bad luck, we should find
that we can't make it, we can always turn off and head for the village
if we have to."

"Yes. So let us get to bed early. It will be a hard day at best, and we
may as well get all the sleep we can."

As my companion had predicted, the morrow did turn out to be a tough
day, and it began early, too. It was about half-past three in the
morning that I was awakened by the crackling of the fire, and sitting up
in my blankets, I saw Dick squatted on his heels, frying bacon over some
of the hot embers.

"Time to turn out, Frank," said he. "Breakfast will be ready in two
minutes; feeling pretty hungry this morning?"

By way of reply, I opened my mouth with a yawn so prodigious that Dick
laughingly continued:

"Hungry as all that, eh? Well, old man, if the size of your mouth is an
indication of the size of your appetite, I'll slice up another
half-pound of bacon!"

At this I laughed too, and jumping up, I ran to the creek, where I
soused my head and face in the cold water, which wakened me up
effectually.

By four o'clock we were under way, steering by compass; for, though the
stars were shining and the waning moon, then near its setting, furnished
some light, there was not enough to enable us to distinguish objects at
any distance. Our progress at first was pretty slow, for horses and
mules do not like traveling by night, but presently there came a change,
the sky behind us took on a rosy hue, and pretty soon there appeared on
the western horizon two glowing points, like a pair of triangular red
lamps hung up in the sky for our guidance--the summits of the Dos
Hermanos caught by the rising sun.

It was an inspiring sight! The very animals, seeming to feel its
influence, brisked up at once and stepped out gaily, while Dick and I,
who had been "mouching" along in silence, straightened up in our saddles
and fell to talking.

"I've been thinking, Dick," said I, "about what our first move should be
after we have found a good camping-place. My idea is that we should ride
down to the neighborhood of Hermanos and see if there is any sign of an
old trail leading from the village to the mountains."

"That's a good idea," Dick responded. "It is pretty certain that the
copper was brought down from the mine on the backs of burros, and the
supplies carried up in the same way, and if that was kept up for several
years there must have been a well-defined trail worn in this soft soil,
which may be visible yet."

"On the other hand," was my comment, "as the travel ceased so long ago,
isn't it probable that the trail will have been blown full of sand and
covered up?"

"That is likely enough--in many places, at least," replied my companion,
"though it is very possible, I think, that there may be some traces
left, for it is surprising how long such marks on the ground continue to
show. At any rate, we'll try it. Here's the sun; it's going to be
pretty hot, I expect."

Slowly we plodded along, hour after hour, until presently we had come
opposite the village, the mud-colored buildings of which, though not
more than three miles away, were barely distinguishable against the
gray-tinted plain upon which they stood. The green fields and gardens
surrounding the houses we could not see, they being below the general
level, but that they were there, and that the Mexicans were at that
moment engaged in irrigating them, we felt very sure. A light wind was
blowing from the south, and Dick declared that he could "smell the wet";
but though I sniffed and sniffed, I could not conscientiously say that I
could detect it myself.

Our animals, however, very evidently smelt it, for they evinced a
decided inclination to bear to the left, and we had a good deal of
difficulty in keeping their heads straight--the slightest inattention on
our part, and they were off the line in a moment. As is so often the
case, they had not cared to drink in the cool of the morning before we
started, and consequently, what with the heat of the sun and the alkali
dust they kicked up, they had become eager for water and would have
made a straight shoot for Hermanos if we had let them.

But we were nearing the mountains, an hour or two more and we should
reach water, probably, so, though it was painful to deny the poor
beasts, we kept right on, until about four in the afternoon--for it had
taken us longer than we had anticipated--when all three of them suddenly
lifted their heads, pricked their ears and wanted to run forward. They
smelt water ahead of them.

Pressing on at an increased pace, we were presently brought to a halt by
coming upon the brink of a cliff, at the base of which was a large pool
of clear water. The pool lay in a little grass-covered valley about half
a mile long, encompassed on all sides by the precipitous wall of rock.
We could not see that there was any way of getting down.

In order to get a better view, Dick and I dismounted and walked to the
edge, when the first thing we saw was a little bunch of half-a-dozen
scrawny Mexican cattle down near the pool.

"Then there is a way down," cried Dick. "Whoop!" he yelled, clapping his
mouth with his hand.

The cattle looked up, and seeing two horseless human beings on the
sky-line above them, away they went up the valley, vanished for an
instant among the fallen rocks at the foot of the cliff, and in another
moment appeared again on our level, going off southward with their tails
in the air, wild as deer.

"Come on!" cried Dick, jumping upon his horse. "Where they came up we
can get down."

Riding forward, we presently found the cow-trail, when, dismounting once
more, for it was too steep to ride without risk of breaking one's neck,
we led our horses down. Within another half-hour Dick and I, comfortably
seated in the shade of the rock, were enjoying a much-needed dinner,
while the three animals, their waist-lines enormously distended with the
gallons of water they had swallowed, were eagerly snapping up the young
green grass with which the valley was covered--all the troubles of the
day completely forgotten.




CHAPTER IX

ANTONIO MARTINEZ


As we wished to give the animals a good rest, we decided to stay where
we were for the remainder of that day and on the morrow move to the foot
of the mountain and look out for a good camping-place from which to make
our preliminary explorations.

The spot where we were then encamped would not serve, for we were yet at
least three miles from the lowest spurs of the twin mountains. The
stream beside which we were seated issued from the northernmost of the
two peaks, and after running out into the plain for some distance made a
great bend and went back almost to the point of departure, when, turning
to the northward, it poured its waters into the deep cañon cut by the
streams which came down from Mescalero and the Ridge. It was just at the
bend that we had struck it.

"What we want, Frank," said my companion, "is a good place in the
foothills, and when we have found one, I propose that we take our
ponies, skirt along the base of the mountains from north to south, and
see if we can't cut across that old trail we were talking about this
morning. It is extremely important that we should do so; it might save
us weeks of useless searching."

"Yes," I assented, "it would be a great help, of course; though all we
can hope to find is some mark in the soil which will point us generally
in one direction or another."

"Yes; and that's just it. If we can find any indication of the direction
the trains used to take when they started from the King's House, it will
lighten our task tremendously. Look here," taking a pointed stick and
drawing a rough plat of the country in the sand. "Here are the two
peaks, lying north and south of each other; here, between them, the
creek comes down which runs two or three miles out on to the plain to
the village here. Now, when the trains used to start out from the _Casa
del Rey_ they took to the right of that stream or they took to the left
of it, one or the other, and if we can do no more than find out which it
was it will be a great help."

"Of course," I responded. "I see that. It would show us whether it was
the north mountain or the south mountain that we had to explore."

"That's it, exactly. And if you stop for a moment to consider, you will
see that that would be a pretty big item all by itself. The two
mountains cover a space about fifteen miles long by, perhaps, ten miles
wide--a hundred and fifty square miles--a pretty big piece of country,
old man, for you and me to scramble over; but if we can find a trail
which will show us which of the two mountains is the right one, that
hundred and fifty miles will be chopped in half at one blow--and if that
isn't a pretty big item all by itself, I should like to know what is."

With that, Dick, who was sitting cross-legged on the ground, stuck his
stick point downward into the middle of his map, planted his hands on
either knee, and with a defiant jerk of his head, challenged me to deny
his conclusion.

I could not help laughing at his emphatic manner, but I could not help,
either, admitting that his point was a good one.

"It certainly would make an immense difference," said I, "and it will
pay us to find that old trail if it takes us a week to do it. So, let us
dig out first thing to-morrow, Dick, and find a good camping-place as a
base."

Accordingly we broke camp again early next morning, and following along
the rim of the cañon we presently drew near the foothills. As we
approached the mountain we were able to distinguish with more clearness
the details of its form, and the more clearly we could distinguish them
the more were we impressed with the difficulty and the magnitude of the
task we had undertaken. It was not going to be the simple,
straightforward matter I had at first imagined.

Seen from a distance the north peak looked smooth and symmetrical, but
when you came close to it you found that it was broken up into cliffs
and cañons, some of them of great height and depth. On its northern
face, a thousand feet or so below the summit, our attention was drawn to
a great semicircular precipice which looked very like the upper half of
an old volcanic crater, the lower half, presumably, having broken away
and fallen down the mountain.

"A pretty tough piece of country, Frank," said my companion, "and a
pretty large stretch of it, too, for us to tramp over; for, by the look
of it from here, our horses won't be much use to us--at least, when we
get up above the lower spurs. Let us try this gully to the left:
there's probably water up there; I see the tops of two or three
cottonwoods."

Turning in that direction, therefore, we presently came upon a
diminutive stream which ran down and fell into the cañon, and passing
between two high rocks, which looked as though they had been split apart
with a wedge to let the water out, we found ourselves in a little
park-like valley, flanked on either side by high ridges.

"This ought to do, Dick," said I, "at any rate for the present; plenty
of grass, plenty of wood and plenty of water. Just the place."

"Yes, this is all right; couldn't be better. Let's unsaddle at once,
make our camp, and after dinner we'll ride down in the direction of
Hermanos and do a little prospecting."

Having chosen a good spot, we arranged a comfortable camp, and after a
hasty dinner we started out; first picketing Uncle Fritz to keep him
from coming trailing after us.

Immediately to the south of our camping-place, forming one of the
boundaries of the little ravine, in fact, there stretched down from the
mountain a great, bare rib of granite, almost devoid of vegetation,
which projected a long way out into the valley, and as it lay square
across our course we decided, instead of going round the end of it, to
ride up to the top in order to get a good lookout over the country we
proposed to examine. From the summit of this ridge, at a point about
four hundred feet above the plain, we were able to get a very good view
of all the wide stretch of comparatively level ground below us,
including the village of Hermanos and the green irrigated fields around
it, which from this elevation were distinctly visible. Except for this
tiny oasis, the whole plain, bounded on the east by the Mosby Ridge, and
on the south by the Santa Clara mountains, appeared to be one uniform,
level stretch of sage-brush desert--dull, gray and uninviting.

"What a pity," remarked Dick, "that there is no water here. If only one
could get water upon it, this sage-brush plain could be turned into a
wheat-field big enough to supply the whole State with bread, besides
furnishing labor and subsistence for a good-sized population of
farmers."

"It would be fine, wouldn't it?" I assented. "And I don't see why it has
never been done: there must be many streams coming down from these
mountains."

"Yes, no doubt; but the difficulty is that all the streams of any
consequence have cut cañons for themselves and are too far below the
general level to be of any use. To get water out upon the surface of
this valley one would have to go high up on the mountain, find some
good-sized stream, head it off--building a dam for the purpose,
perhaps--and then conduct the water down here by a ditch several miles
long possibly. Far too big an undertaking, you see, for these penniless,
unenterprising Mexicans."

"I see. It would take a great deal of work and a great deal of money,
probably, but it would be a fine thing to do, all the same."

"Yes, it would; and some day it will be done. It won't be so very many
years before all the 'easy water' in the State will have been
appropriated, and then people will begin to look out for a supply in the
more out-of-the-way places, building reservoirs to catch the rainfall
which now runs to waste after every thunder-storm, and carrying the
water long distances to sell it to the ranchman. The professor says that
some day the business of catching and distributing irrigation water will
be the most important industry in the State, and that a good
ever-flowing stream will be more valuable than any silver mine."

"I can understand that," I replied. "The best mine will some day come
to an end, for when the silver is once dug out it is gone--you can't
plant more; whereas, a good stream of water applied on the soil will go
on producing forever and ever."

"That's it, exactly. And some day that is what will happen here. This
fine stretch of level land, which now grows only grass enough to support
about three cows and a burro, won't always lie idle. Some enterprising
fellow will come along, climb up into this mountain, catch one of those
streams which now go running off through the cañons, turn it down here,
and a couple of years later this worthless desert will be converted into
farms and orchards."

"A fine undertaking, too!" I exclaimed. "I should like to have a try at
it myself."

"So should I. But our object in life just now is 'copper,' so come on,
old chap, and let us ride down to the point of this ridge. What is that
black speck down there toward the village? Man on horseback? Ah! He has
disappeared again. Well, come on now, Frank. Let's get started."

Getting down upon the plain again, we turned southward, skirting the
base of the mountain, winding our way through the sage-brush, which was
large and very thick, when, after riding barely a quarter of a mile in
that direction, Dick suddenly pulled up.

"Frank!" he exclaimed. "Look here! Doesn't it seem to you that there is
a depression in the soil going off to the right and the left? Look away
a hundred yards and you will see what I mean. It seems to lead straight
up into the mountain one way, and straight out upon the plain the other
way."

At first I could not detect anything of the sort, but on Dick's pointing
it out more particularly it did appear to me that there was a depression
going off in both directions.

"Let us turn to the left, Dick," said I, "and follow it--if we can--out
into the valley and see what becomes of it."

"All right," responded my companion. "Let's do so."

The mark on the ground was by no means easy to follow, it was so
overgrown with sage-brush, and in many places altogether obliterated by
drifting sand, but, though we frequently lost it, by looking far ahead
we always caught the line again. Presently we found that it went
curving off to the right in the direction of Hermanos, and our hopes
rose.

"Dick!" I cried. "This is no accidental mark in the soil! It is a trail,
as sure as you live!"

"It does begin to look like it," replied my more cautious friend. "I
believe it---- Hallo! Who's this coming?"

As he spoke, I saw about half a mile away a horseman coming toward us at
an easy lope from the direction of the village. He was riding a handsome
gray horse, very superior to the little bronchos we ourselves bestrode.

"He rides well," said I. "I wonder how he got so close to us on this
flat country without our seeing him."

"The country is probably not quite so flat as it looks," replied my
companion. "I expect the man has been keeping in the hollows so that he
might slip up on us unobserved. It is probably old Galvez coming to find
out what we are doing prowling around his domain. He must be the
horseman I saw just now, and I've no doubt he saw us, too, cocked up on
that bare ridge--for all these Mexicans have eyes like hawks."

Meanwhile the rider continued to approach, and as he came nearer we
observed, rather to our relief, that it could not be the padron, for the
stranger was a well-dressed young Mexican, only three or four years
older than ourselves, a handsome, intelligent-looking young fellow, too,
with a trim little black moustache and bright black eyes--evidently one
of a class superior to the ordinary cow-man or farm-hand.

Watching him closely as he came up, wondering what sort of a reception
we should get from him, it appeared to me that he, too, looked both
surprised and relieved when he perceived that instead of the two rough
and sturdy prospectors he had probably expected to meet, it was only a
couple of boys, younger than himself, with whom he had to deal.

And it is likely that he did feel relieved, for at that time the white
men--or, at least, very many of them--dwelling on what was then the
outer edge of civilization, were apt to look down upon all Mexicans as
people of an inferior race, frequently treating them in consequence in a
rough, overbearing manner by no means calculated to promote friendly
feeling.

The young Mexican doubtless "sized us up" favorably; at any rate, no
sooner had he come near enough to see what we were like than he rode
straight up to us, and addressing us politely in Spanish, said:

"Good-day, sirs. Are you going down to Hermanos? I shall be glad to ride
with you if you are."

It happened that I was the one to whom he addressed this salutation,
Dick being a little further back. Now, though I had acquired enough of
the language to understand and speak it fairly well, the Spanish I had
learned was good Castilian, whereas the young Mexican spoke a kind of
_patois_, such as is commonly used among all the natives of these
outlying settlements. The unexpected difference of pronunciation, though
slight, caused me to hesitate an instant in making reply--I have no
doubt, too, my face looked rather blank--whereupon the young fellow
instantly jumped to the conclusion that we did not speak Spanish at all,
and he therefore repeated his remark in English.

It was without any thought of misleading him that I replied, very
naturally, in the tongue which came easiest to me, and as the stranger
spoke English quite as well as I did, it was very natural again that the
conversation should be continued in that tongue. Thus it happened that
we accidentally deceived him--or, rather, he deceived himself--into the
belief that we did not understand any language but our own, and as no
opportunity cropped up during our talk for setting him right, he
continued in this mistaken idea; a fact which, a little later, caused us
considerable satisfaction--not on our own account, but on his.

Replying to his question therefore in English, I said:

"No, we were not bound for Hermanos in particular. We have come down
here to do a little prospecting, and were just riding around a bit to
take a look at the country. Do you live here?"

"No," he replied, "I live in Santa Fé. My name is Antonio Martinez. I am
on a visit here to my uncle, Señor Galvez, the padron of Hermanos. He is
my mother's brother, and as she had not seen him for many years, and as
he has always declined to come to us, she sent me here to make his
acquaintance. For myself, I had never even seen him until I arrived here
two weeks ago, and----"

He checked himself suddenly, looking a little confused; I had an idea
that what he was going to say was that he did not much care if he never
saw him again.

"And are you expecting to stay here?" asked Dick.

"No, I go back in a day or two. Where do you, yourselves hail from, if I
may ask? From Mosby?"

"Yes, from Mosby," replied Dick. "We came down, as my friend said, to do
some prospecting up in one or other of these two peaks--we don't know
which one yet. How is the country up there? Pretty accessible? You've
been up, I suppose."

"No, I haven't," replied the young Mexican. "You think that rather
strange, don't you? And naturally enough. Here have I been for two weeks
hanging around this village with absolutely nothing to do; I should have
been glad enough to make an expedition up into the mountains--in fact, I
had a very particular reason for wishing to do so--but when I suggested
the idea to the padron, explaining to him why I was so anxious to go, he
not only refused emphatically for himself, but declined to let me go
either."

"Why, that seems queer!" cried Dick.

"It does, doesn't it? And his reason for refusing will appear to you
queerer still--he's afraid!"

"Afraid!" we both exclaimed. "Afraid of what?"

"Afraid of The Badger," replied the young fellow, breaking into a laugh
as he noted the mystified look which came over both our faces.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "Why should he--or anybody--be afraid of a
badger?"

"I said _The_ Badger," replied our friend. "You have never heard of him,
evidently--El Tejon, The Badger."

We both shook our heads.

"What is he?" I asked. "A man?"

"Yes--or a wild beast. It is hard to say which. He is a Mexican who once
lived in the village here, I believe. For some reason which I cannot
understand--for my uncle won't talk about it, though I have asked him
several times--for some reason The Badger conceived a violent hatred for
the padron; whether he went crazy or not, I don't know, but anyhow he
committed a murderous assault upon him, hurting him badly--knocked out
all his front teeth with a stone, for one thing--and then escaped into
the mountains. That was twelve years ago, and as far as any one knows he
is there yet, if he is still alive."

"And wasn't any attempt ever made to capture him?" asked Dick.

"Once," replied Antonio. "According to the padron's story, he went out
with six of his cow-men to try to run The Badger to earth; but the
attempt was a failure, as was only to be expected, for the cow-men were
very unwilling to go. They trembled at the very name of El Tejon, who
was a man of immense strength and a great hunter, and they feared that
instead of catching him, he would catch one of them. And the event
showed that they had reason. They had been out several days, had ridden
all over the lower part of the north mountain without seeing a sign of
their man, and were coming back, single file, down a narrow gully, when
the padron's horse suddenly, and seemingly without cause, fell down,
stone dead. The rider, of course, fell too, and striking his head
against a stone he lay for a moment stunned. No one could think what had
happened to the horse, until presently one of the men noticed blood upon
the rocks, and turning the animal over they were all scared out of their
wits by seeing the head of an arrow sticking out between his ribs."

"An arrow!" we both cried.

"Yes, an arrow," continued the narrator, not noticing the glance Dick
and I exchanged. "They knew well enough where it came from, for The
Badger had always hunted with a bow and arrow, with which he was
extraordinarily expert. The instant the cow-men saw what had happened
they stuck spurs into their horses and away they all went,
helter-skelter, leaving their leader lying on the ground."

"That was a pretty shabby desertion," said I. "How did the padron
escape?"

"That is one of the things I can't understand," replied Antonio. "Why
the man, having him so entirely in his power, didn't kill him at once is
a puzzle to me. As it was, when the padron recovered his senses, he
found El Tejon calmly seated on the carcase of the horse, waiting for
him to wake up. He quite expected, he says, to be murdered forthwith,
but instead, the man merely held up the arrow, which he had drawn out of
the horse's body, and said: 'For you--next time'; and with that he arose
and walked off. The padron is no coward, but he knows when to let well
enough alone: he has never been up on the mountain since."

"That's a curious story," said Dick. "What sort of a looking man is this
El Tejon?"

"I've never seen him myself, of course," replied our friend, "but the
padron describes him as a very remarkable man to look at: less than five
feet high, with an immense body, very short legs and very long arms."

Dick and I exchanged glances again.

"Whether the man is yet alive," continued the young fellow, "nobody
knows. It is nearly twelve years ago that this happened, and since then
he has never been seen nor heard of. The chances are, I expect, that he
has been long dead."

"On that point," remarked Dick, "we can give _you_ a little information.
He is not dead--at least he wasn't last fall."




CHAPTER X

THE PADRON


"What do you mean?" cried Antonio. "How do you know? I thought you said
you had never heard of him."

"We hadn't," replied Dick, "until you mentioned his name, but from your
description we have no doubt we saw him some months ago up here at the
head of the valley."

With this by way of preface, my companion related to our new
acquaintance the particulars of our "interview" with the "little giant,"
as he called him.

"It must be the same man," said Antonio. "I wonder what he was doing so
far away from his own mountain. You say he shot the wolf with a
copper-headed arrow? That's something I should like to investigate, if
only the padron were not so dead set against my going up into the
mountain. Where does he get his copper? In fact----" He paused to
consider, and then went on: "Yes; I don't see why I shouldn't tell
you--my uncle won't go himself, and he won't let me go, so I may as
well tell _you_. The truth is that the reason why I was so anxious to
make an excursion up there was just that--to find out where El Tejon
gets his copper. And not only he, but the villagers down here. Every
house in Hermanos has its copper bowl and dipper. They are hammered out
of lumps of native copper; some of them must weigh five or six pounds.
Where did they come from? Lumps of copper of that size were not washed
down the streams--they were dug up. But by whom, and where?"

I felt a great inclination to tell him. He had been so friendly and
communicative that I began to feel rather uncomfortable at the thought
that we were drawing all this information from him under what might be
regarded as false pretences.

I was pretty sure that Dick would be feeling much the same--for among
boys, as I have many a time noticed, there is nothing more catching than
open-heartedness--and I was right; for, glancing at him to see what he
thought, I caught his eye, when he immediately raised his eyebrows a
trifle, as much as to say, "Shall I tell him?"

"Yes," said I, aloud. "I think so. Though we must remember, Dick, that
it isn't altogether our secret."

Dick nodded, and turning to the young Mexican, who was gazing at us
open-eyed, wondering what we were talking about, he said:

"Senor Antonio, my friend and I agree that it isn't quite fair to you to
let you go on telling us these things without our telling you something
in return. As Frank says, it is not altogether our own secret, but at
the same time we don't think it is quite a square deal to get all these
particulars from you and to keep you in the dark about ourselves. I can
tell you this much, anyhow: that our object in coming down here was to
find out where those same lumps of copper did come from."

"Why, how did _you_ know anything about them?" cried Antonio, opening
his eyes wider still.

"I passed through Hermanos about eighteen months ago," replied Dick, "in
company with a German naturalist, Herr Bergen, when we noticed the great
number of copper bowls and things, and the sight of them reminded the
professor of a story he had heard of an old copper mine, abandoned more
than a hundred years ago, supposed to be somewhere down in this
country. The story the professor told us is the story which we think we
have no business to repeat, but I can tell you this much, at least, that
it seemed to indicate the Dos Hermanos as the site of the old mine; and
so we got leave to come down here to see if we couldn't trail it up."

"Is that so? What fun you will have. I wish I could go with you. But
that, I know, is out of the question: the padron would not consent, and
I could not go against his will. But if I can help you I shall be very
glad. Does the story you refer to indicate which of the two peaks is the
right one?"

"No, it doesn't," replied Dick. "We suppose that the copper used to be
brought down to the _Casa_ on pack-burros, and we thought there might be
the remains of a trail down here in the valley. That is what we were
doing when you rode up:--looking for the trail; and we thought perhaps
we had found it when we discovered this indentation in the soil that we
have been following."

"And I believe you have!" cried Antonio. "That's just what you have! It
goes on straight southward from here, very plain, to within half a mile
of the _Casa_ and then seems to die out for some reason. But, that it is
the old trail I feel certain. Your copper mine is up there on the north
peak as sure as----"

He stopped short, his enthusiasm suddenly died out, and pulling a long
face, he gazed at us rather blankly.

"Well?" asked Dick.

"I was forgetting. There's something else up there on the north peak."

"What's that?"

"The Badger!"

"That's so!" cried Dick. "I'd forgotten him, too. Do you suppose he
would interfere with us?"

"That's more than I can say. From what the padron has told me, I imagine
it is only to him that El Tejon objects, and perhaps also to me as one
of the family; but I'm not sure about that. Look here! I'll tell you
what I'll do. I'll just ride home and ask him what he thinks. You stay
here. I'll be back in half an hour."

"You are very kind," said my partner. "But why should we trouble you to
come back here? We'll ride down with you."

To our surprise the young fellow flushed and looked embarrassed, but
recovering in a moment, he said:

"Come on, then. But before we go, let me tell you something. The reason
I hesitated was that I feared you might not receive a very hearty
welcome from the padron. The truth of the matter is--to put it plainly,
once for all--he hates strangers, and above all he hates the Americans.
I am sorry it should be so, but so it is. The feeling is not uncommon
among the older Mexicans: those who went through the war of '46; and if
you stop to think of it, it isn't altogether unreasonable. According to
the padron's view of the matter, his native country was invaded without
cause or justice; he, himself, fought against the invader; his own
brother and many of his friends were killed; and finally, he saw the
land where he was born torn away from its old moorings and attached to
the country of the enemy."

This defence of his fellow-countryman, which the young Mexican delivered
with much earnestness and feeling, was a revelation to me. Hitherto I
had only considered the war with Mexico from our side, glorying in our
success and admiring--very rightly--the bravery of our soldiers. That
the Mexicans, themselves, might have a point of view of their own had
never occurred to me, until this young fellow thus held up their side of
the picture for me to see.

"That's a matter I never thought of before," said I; "but when you do
stop to think of it, it is _not_ surprising that the older generation of
Mexicans should have no liking for us."

"No," Dick chimed in; "and I don't think you can blame them, either."

"I'm glad you see it that way," said Antonio. "It makes things all
comfortable for me. So, now, let us get along. And if the padron doesn't
seem best pleased to see you, you will know why."

Following along the line of the supposed trail, which continued in
general to be pretty plain, we presently passed alongside of a high bank
of earth to which our guide called our attention.

"Just ride up here a minute," said he. "Now, do you see how this
earth-bank forms a perfect square, measuring about two hundred yards
each way? What do you make of that?"

"It was evidently built up," said I; "it can't be a natural formation.
But what the earth was piled up for, I can't see."

"I think I can," remarked Dick. "If I'm not mistaken, this is the site
of an old pueblo."

"Just what I think," responded Antonio. "An old pueblo which probably
stood here before ever the Spaniards came to the country, and has been
melted down to this shapeless bank by the rains of centuries. This
valley must have supported a good-sized population once--very much
larger than at present."

"It looks like it," Dick assented. "I wonder where they got their water
from--for I suppose they lived mostly by agriculture, as the Pueblos do
still. Hasn't the padron ever tried to find the old source of supply?"

The young Mexican shook his head. "No," said he. "The source of supply,
wherever it was, was up in the mountains somewhere, and in spite of the
fact that if he could find it, it would increase the value of the grant
a thousand times, he daren't go to look for it."

"My! What a chance there is here"--Dick began, when he suddenly checked
himself. "Here's some one coming," said he. "Is this the padron?"

"Yes; he must be coming to see who you are. I hope he won't make himself
unpleasant."

As Antonio spoke, there came riding toward us a square-set, gray-haired
Mexican, at whom, as he approached, we gazed with much interest. He was
a man of fifty, or thereabouts, harsh-featured and forbidding, who
scowled at us in a manner which made me, at least, rather wish I had not
come. To put it shortly and plainly, the Señor Galvez had, in fact, the
most truculent countenance I had ever seen; and his first remark to his
nephew, as the latter advanced to meet him, was on a par with his
appearance.

"What are you bringing these American pigs here for, Antonio?" he
growled, in Spanish. "You know I will have nothing to do with them."

Poor Antonio flushed painfully under his brown skin. He half raised his
hand with a deprecatory gesture, as though to beg the speaker to be more
moderate, while he glanced uneasily at us out of the corner of his eye
to see if we had understood.

It was then that Dick and I congratulated ourselves on having
accidentally deceived our friend into the belief that we did not speak
Spanish. Suppressing our natural desire to bandy a few compliments with
the churlish padron, we put on an expression of countenance as stolid
and vacant as if we had been indeed the American pigs
aforesaid--immensely to the comfort of the younger man, as it was easy
to see.

"Do not be harsh, señor," said he. "They are only boys, and they are
doing no harm here. Moreover," he went on, "they have brought you a
piece of information which you will be glad to have:--El Tejon is still
alive."

The elder man started; his weather-beaten face paled a little.

"How do they know that?" he asked, suspiciously.

Antonio briefly told him our story.

"Hm!" grunted the padron, glowering at us from under his bushy eyebrows.
"But what are these boys skulking around here for? They don't pretend, I
suppose, that they have come all the way down from Mosby just to tell me
they have seen El Tejon."

"Not at all," replied Antonio, with considerable spirit. "They are
gentlemen, and they don't pretend anything. That bigger one of the two,
the freckled one with the hook-nose and red hair"--it was Dick he meant,
and intense was my desire to wink at him and laugh--"that one passed
through here before; he noticed how every house contained its copper
bowl and dipper--just as I did--and he has come down here with his
friend--just as I wanted to do--to try to find out where the copper
came from. We have had a long talk about it, and we have concluded that
it probably came from somewhere up on the north peak. What I brought
them down here for was to ask you whether you thought The Badger would
let them alone if they went up there--that's all."

"That's all, is it? Well, perhaps it is. But I'm suspicious of
strangers, Antonio, especially since----"

He paused, seemingly considering whether he should or should not mention
the subject he had in mind, but at length--evidently supposing that we
could not understand what he was saying--he went on:

"I had not intended to say anything to you about it, but three days
ago--the day you rode over to Zapatero to spend the night--something
occurred here which makes me rather uneasy. I had been away all day
myself that day and on my return I found a young man in the village who
had come, he said, from Santa Fé. For a young man to come to this
out-of-the-way place, all alone, from Santa Fé, or from anywhere else,
for that matter, was a strange thing: it made me suspicious that he was
after no good. And I became more than suspicious when I found that he
had spent the day going from one house to another inquiring after El
Tejon!"

"Inquiring after El Tejon!" repeated Antonio. "That was strange;
especially considering that El Tejon has been practically dead for a
dozen years. Did he offer any explanation?"

"No. To tell the truth, I did not give him the opportunity. When I found
out what he was doing, how he had slipped into the village during my
absence and had gone prying about among these ignorant peons, asking
questions concerning my enemy, I was so enraged that I threatened to
shoot him if he did not depart at once. I made a mistake there, I admit;
if I had curbed my anger, I might have found out what his object was.
But I did not, so there is no more to be said."

"That was unfortunate," said Antonio; "but, as you say, it can't be
helped now. So the stranger went off, did he? Did he return to----"

"No, he didn't," Galvez interrupted, "or, at any rate, not immediately.
I'll tell you how I know. I was so distrustful of him that I followed
his trail next morning--it was dark when he left, and I couldn't do it
then. It was an easy trail to follow, for his horse was shod, and ours,
of course, are not. It led eastward for a mile and then turned back,
circled round the village and went up into the north mountain. I have
not seen him, nor a trace of him since."

"It is a strange thing," said Antonio, thoughtfully. "What was the young
man like? How old? Was he a Mexican or an American?"

"I don't know. He looked like an American, though he spoke Spanish
perfectly. He might be twenty years old. It is an odd thing,
Antonio--and it is that, perhaps, which made me speak so sharply when I
first saw these new friends of yours--but the young man was something
like the bigger one of these two boys: the same hook-nose and light-gray
eyes, though his hair was black instead of red."

"A strange thing altogether," said Antonio, reflectively. "I don't
wonder you feel a little uneasy."

"As to these boys here," the padron went on, jerking his head in our
direction, "you may tell them that they need not fear The Badger. It is
only I who have cause to fear him, and perhaps you, as my nephew. These
boys may go where they like without danger. The chances are they won't
see El Tejon--they certainly won't if he doesn't want to be seen. And,
Antonio, just thank them for bringing me their information, and then
send them off."

So saying, old Galvez turned his unmannerly back on us and rode away.

The interview, if it can be called such--for the padron had not
addressed a single word to us--being plainly at an end, we shook hands
with our friend, Antonio, and having thanked him very heartily for his
service, we set off for camp, riding fast, in our hurry to get back
before darkness should overtake us.




CHAPTER XI

THE SPANISH TRAIL


"Dick," said I, as we sat together that evening beside our camp-fire,
"what do you make of it? That was a queer thing, that young fellow
coming inquiring for El Tejon. I confess, for my part, I can't make head
or tail of it."

"I can't either," replied Dick; "at least, as far as this stranger is
concerned. I'm quite in the dark on that point. As to the padron and The
Badger, though, that seems to me simple enough. It is some old feud
between the two which concerns nobody but themselves."

"That is how it strikes me. You don't think, then, that there is any
danger to us?"

"No, I don't. In fact, I feel sure of it. It is just a personal quarrel
of long standing between those two--that's all. I have no more fear of
El Tejon than I have of any other Mexican. All the same, old chap, if
you have any doubt about it, I'm ready to quit and go home again."

"No," I replied, emphatically. "I vote we go on. And I'll tell you why,
Dick. For one thing, I always did hate to give up."

My partner nodded appreciation.

"For another thing, I have gathered the notion that this Badger is not a
bad fellow; not at all the kind that would murder a man in his sleep or
shoot him from behind a rock. The fact that he let old Galvez go that
time when he had him helpless, seems to me pretty good evidence that he
is a man of some generosity and above-boardness."

"That's a fact," Dick assented; "it was rather a fine action, as it
seems to me. And unless I'm vastly mistaken, Frank," he went on, "if the
cases had been reversed, and the padron had caught The Badger as The
Badger caught the padron, it would have been all up with El Tejon. I
never saw a harder-looking specimen in my life than old Galvez. I know,
if he were my enemy, I should be mighty sorry to fall into his hands."

"So should I; and the less we have to do with him the better, to my
notion. I think we shall do well to steer clear of him."

"Yes; and there won't be any temptation to go near him, anyhow,
especially as Antonio won't be there to act as a buffer. So, we decide
to go on, do we?" Dick concluded, as he arose to put two big logs on the
fire for the night. "All right. Then we'll get out to-morrow morning.
We'll take the line of the old trail and follow it up into the mountain
as far as it goes--or as far as we can, perhaps I should say."

"Very well," I agreed. "And we may as well abandon this camp, take old
Fritz and all our belongings with us, and find another place more
suitable higher up the mountain."

"Yes; so now to bed."

We were up betimes next morning, and having packed our traps away we
went, Dick in the lead, Fritz following, and I bringing up the rear.
Climbing over the big ridge from whose crest we had surveyed the valley
the day before, we rode down its other side to the line of the old
trail, and there, turning to the right, we followed it as it gradually
ascended, until presently at the head of the ravine the trail, greatly
to our perplexity, came to an end altogether.

The ravine itself had become so narrow and its sides so precipitous that
there appeared to be no way of climbing out of it, and we began to have
our doubts as to whether it could really be an old trail that we had
been following after all, when Dick, spying about, discovered a
much-washed-out crevice on the right-hand side, so grown up with trees
and brush as to be hardly distinguishable.

"Frank," said he, "they must have come down here--there's no other way
that I can see. Wait a moment till I get up there and see if the trail
isn't visible again up on top."

It was a pretty stiff scramble to get up, but as soon as he had reached
the top my partner shouted down to me to come up--he had found the trail
once more.

If it had been a stiff climb for Dick's horse, it was stiffer still for
old Fritz with his bulky pack. But Fritz was a first-rate animal for
mountain work, having had lots of practice, and being allowed to choose
his own course and take his own time he made the ascent without damaging
himself or his burden.

As soon as I had rejoined him, Dick pointed out to me the line of the
trail, which, bearing away northward now, was much more distinct than it
had been down below. For one thing, the ground here was a great deal
harder; and for another, being well sheltered by the pine woods, the
trail had not drifted full of sand as it had out on the unprotected
valley. There were, it is true, frequent places where the rains of many
years had washed the soil down the hillsides and covered it up, but in
general it was easily distinguishable as it went winding along the base
of the mountain proper, at the point where the steeper slopes merged
into the great spurs which projected out into the valley.

The distinctness of the old trail was, indeed, a surprise to me, its
line was so much easier to follow than I had expected. If it continued
to be as plain as this, we should have no trouble in keeping it; and so
I remarked to my companion.

"That's true," Dick assented, adding: "I'll tell you what, Frank: this
must surely have been a government enterprise. Just see how much work
has been expended on this trail--and needlessly, I should say--no
private individual or corporation would have taken the trouble to make a
carefully graded road like this--for that is what it really was
apparently. It must have been some manager handling government funds and
not worrying himself much about the amount he spent."

"I shouldn't wonder," said I.

"Just notice," Dick continued, pointing out the places with his finger.
"See what useless expenditure they made. Whenever they came to a dip,
big or little, instead of going down one side and up the other, as any
ordinary human being would do, they carried their road round the end of
the gully--just as though a loaded burro would object to coming up a
little hill like this one, for instance, here in front of us."

"It does seem rather ridiculous," I assented. "And they must have laid
out their line with care, too, for, if you notice, Dick, it goes on
climbing up the mountain with a grade which seems to be perfectly
uniform as far as we can see it. It is more like a railroad grade than a
trail. It isn't possible, is it, Dick," I asked, as the thought suddenly
occurred to me, "it isn't possible that they can have used wheeled
vehicles?"

"Hm!" replied my companion, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "No, I think
not. It would be extremely improbable, to say the least. No, I think it
is more likely to be as I said: some lordly government official,
spending government funds, and not troubling himself whether the income
would warrant the expenditure or not."

"I suppose that was probably it," said I. "There's one thing sure,
Dick," I added: "if the income did warrant the expenditure, that old
copper mine must have been a staver and no mistake."

"That's a fact. Well, come on; let us go ahead and see where the trail
takes us."

This following of the trail was a perfectly simple matter; the animals
themselves, in fact, took to it and kept to it as naturally as though
even they recognized it as a road. So, on we went, climbing gradually
higher at every step, when, on rounding the shoulder of a big spur, we
were brought to a sudden and most unexpected halt by coming plump upon
the edge of a deep and very narrow cañon. Right up to the very brink of
this great chasm the trail led us, and there, of necessity, it abruptly
ended.

This gorge, which was perhaps a thousand feet deep, and, as I have said,
extremely narrow--not more than thirty feet wide at the point where we
had struck it--came down from the north face of the mountain, and, as we
could see from where we stood, ran out eastward into the plain. It was
undoubtedly the stream upon which we had camped when we had come across
the valley two days before.

Looking the other way--to the left, that is: up stream--our view was
limited, but from what we could see of it, the country in that
direction bade fair to be inaccessible, for horses, at least; while as
to the cañon itself, it curved first to the left and then to the right
in such a manner that we could not see to the bottom. Moreover a large
rock, rising from the edge of the gorge, and in fact overhanging it a
little, cut off our view up stream.

On the opposite side of the chasm the ground rose high and rocky, an
exceedingly rough piece of country; for though it was in general well
clothed with trees, we could see in a score of places great bare-topped
ridges and pinnacles of rock projecting high above the somber woods.

"Dick," said I, "this looks rather like the end of things. What are we
to do now?"

"The end of things!" cried Dick. "Not a bit of it! Don't you see, on the
other side of the cañon, exactly opposite, that little ravine which goes
winding up the mountain until it loses itself among the trees? Well,
that is the continuation of the trail. Come down here to the edge and
I'll show you."

Dismounting from our horses, we advanced as near the rim of the chasm as
we dared, when Dick, pointing across to the other side, said:

"Look there, Frank, about a foot below the top. Do you see those two
square niches cut in the face of the rock? This place was spanned by a
bridge once, and those two niches are where the ends of the big
stringers rested."

"It does look like it!" I exclaimed. "If there are other similar niches
on this side, that would settle it. Take hold of my feet, will you,
while I stick my head over the edge and see?"

With Dick firmly clasping my ankle by way of precaution, I crept to the
rim and craned my neck out over the precipice as far as I dared venture.
As we had expected, there were the two corresponding niches, while about
ten feet below them were two others, the existence of which puzzled me.
Squirming carefully back again, I rose to my feet and told Dick what I
had seen.

"Two others, eh?" said he. "That's easily explained. Look across again
and you will see that there are two in the face of the opposite cliff to
match them. Those people not only laid two big stringers across the
cañon, but they supported them from below with four stays set in those
lower holes."

"That must be it!" I exclaimed. "They did things well, didn't they--it
is on a par with the work they expended on the trail. The trail itself,
of course, went on up that little ravine and has since been washed out
by the rains."

"Yes; and the bridge has rotted and fallen into the stream; unless they
destroyed it purposely when they abandoned the mine."

"Well, Dick," said I. "It seems fairly sure that the mine was over
there, somewhere in the rough country on the other side of the cañon.
The question is, how are _we_ to get over there?"

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