by B. M. Bower
CHAPTER XVIII. IN THE DEVIL'S FRYING-PAN
Luck, riding confidently on the trail of the three horsemen who hadtaken to the south along the front of the square butte, believed thatthe turn of the trail around the southern end meant simply that thethree who came this way would meet their companions on the other side,and that he, following after, would be certain to meet Applehead. He hadhopes of the speedy capture of Ramon Chavez and his men, and thehope spread to the four who went with him, so that their spirits roseconsiderably. Big Medicine and Happy Jack even found a good deal ofamusement in their exchange of opinions regarding old granny Appleheadand his constant fear of the Navvies. Now and then the Native Son joinedin the laugh, though his attention was chiefly given to the discussionAndy and Luck were having about Ramon and his manner of using Luck'swork as an opportunity to rob the bank, and the probable effect it wouldhave on the general standing of Luck and his company unless they managedto land the thieves in jail. Being half Mexican himself, the Native Sonwas sensitive upon the subject of Ramon, and almost as anxious to seeRamon in jail as was Luck himself.
So while Applehead and his boys were scenting danger and then findingthemselves in the middle of it, Luck and his party rode along absorbedin themselves and in the ultimate goal, which was Ramon. They sawnothing queer about the trail they followed, and they saw no evidenceof treachery anywhere. They rode with the rifles slung under theirright thighs and their six-shooters at their hips, and their eyes rovingcasually over their immediate surroundings while their minds rovedelsewhere--not because they were growing careless, but because there wasabsolutely nothing to rouse their suspicions, now that they no longerbad Applehead along to preach danger and keep them keyed up to expectit.
They followed the tracks through a scattered grove of stunted pinons,circled at fault for a few minutes in the rocks beyond, and then pickedup the trail. They were then in the narrow neck which was calledthe handle of the Devil's Frying-pan--and they would have riddenunsuspectingly into the very Pan itself, had not the Native Son's quickeyes caught a movement on the rim-rock across the bare, rock-bottomedbasin. He spoke to luck about it, and luck levelled his field glassesand glimpsed a skulking form up there.
"Hunt yourselves some shelter, boys!" he cried in the sharp tone ofwarning. "We'll make sure who's ahead before we go any farther."
They ducked behind rocks or trees and piled off their horses in a burry.And a scattered fusillade from the rim-rock ahead of them proved howurgent was their need.
For the first fifteen minutes or so they thought that they were fightingRamon and his party, and their keenest emotions were built largely ofresentment, which showed in the booming voice of Big Medicine when hesaid grimly:
"Well, I'd jest about as soon pack Ramon in dead, as lead 'im in alive'n' kickin', by cripes! Which is him, d'yuh reckon?"
From behind a rock shield luck was studying the ledge. "They'reInjuns--or there are Injuns in the bunch, at least," he told them aftera moment. "See that sharp point sticking up straight ahead? I saw anInjun peeking around the edge--to the south. You watch for him, Andy,and let him have it where he lives next time be sticks his head out." Heswung the glasses slowly, taking every inch of the rim in his field ofvision. As he moved them be named the man he wanted to watch each placewhere he had reason to suspect that someone was hiding.
The disheartening part of it was that he needed about a dozen moremen than he had; for the rock wall which was the rim of the Frying-panseemed alive with shooters who waited only for a fair target. Then theNative Son, crouched down between a rock and a clump of brush, turnedhis head to see what his horse was looking at, back whence they hadcome.
"Look behind you, Luck," he advised with more calmness than one wouldexpect of a man in his straits. "They're back in the pines, too."
"Fight 'em off--and take care that your backs don't show to those babieson the rim-rocks," he ordered instantly, thrusting his glasses intotheir case and snatching his rifle from its boot on the saddle. "Theywon't tackle coming across that bare hollow, even if they can get downinto it without breaking their necks. Happy, lead your horse inhere between these rocks where mine is. Bud, see if you can get thepack-horses over there outa sight among those bushes and rocks. We'llhold 'em off while you fix the horses--can't let ourselves be set afootout here!"
"I-should-say--NOT!" Andy Green punctuated the sentence with a shot ortwo. "Say, I wish they'd quit sneaking around in those trees that way,so a fellow could see where to shoot!"
A half hour dragged by. From the rim-rock came occasional shots,to which the besieged could not afford to reply, they were so fullyoccupied with holding back those who skulked among the trees. Thehorses, fancying perhaps that this was a motion-picture scene, dozedbehind their rock-and-brush shelters and switched apathetically atbuzzing flies and whining bullets alike. Their masters crouched behindtheir bowlders and watched catlike for some open demonstration, andfired when they had the slightest reason to believe that they would hitsomething besides scenery.
"Miguel must have upset their plans a little," Luck deduced after alull. "They set the stage for us down in that hollow, I guess. You cansee what we'd have been up against if we had ridden ten rods farther,out away from these rocks and bushes."
"Aw, they wouldn't dast kill a bunch uh white men!" Happy Jackprotested, perhaps for his own comfort.
"You think they wouldn't? Luck's voice was surcharged with sarcasm. Whatdo you think they're trying to do, then?"
"Aw, the gov'ment wouldn't STAND fer no such actions!"
"Well, by cripes, I hain't aimin' to give the gov'ment no job uhsetting on my remains, investigatin' why I was killed off!" Big Medicineasserted, and took a shot at a distant grimy Stetson to prove he meantwhat he said.
"Say, they'd have had a SNAP if we'd gone on, and let these fellows backhere in the trees close up behind us!" Andy Green exclaimed suddenly,with a vividness of gesture that made Happy Jack try to swallow hisAdam's apple. "By gracious, it would have been a regular rabbit-drivebusiness. They could set in the shade and pick us off just as theydarned pleased."
"Aw, is that there the cheerfullest thing you can think of to say?"Happy Jack was sweating, with something more than desert heat.
"Why, no. The cheerfullest thing I can think of right now is thatMig, here, don't ride with his eyes shut." He cast a hasty glance ofgratitude toward the Native Son, who flushed under the smooth brown ofhis cheeks while he fired at a moving bush a hundred yards back in thegrove.
For another half hour nothing was gained or lost. The Indians fireddesultorily, spatting bit& of lead here and there among the rocksbut hitting nobody. The Happy Family took a shot at every symptom ofmovement in the grove, and toward the rim-rock they sent a bulletnow and then, just to assure the watchers up there that they were notforgotten, and as a hint that caution spelled safety.
For themselves, the boys were amply protected there on the side of theFrying-pan where the handle stretched out into the open land toward themountain. Perhaps here was once a torrent flowing from the basin-likehollow walled round with rock; at any rate, great bowlders werescattered all along the rim as though spewed from the basin by somemighty force of the bygone ages. The soil, as so often happens in theWest, was fertile to the very edge of the Frying-pan and young pinonsand bushes had taken root there and managed to keep themselves alivewith the snow-moisture of winter, in spite of the scanty rainfall therest of the year.
The boys were amply protected, yes; but there was not a drop of watersave what they had in their canteens, and there was no feed for theirhorses unless they chose to nibble tender twigs off the bushes near themand call that food. There was, of course, the grain in the packs, butthere was neither time nor opportunity to get it out. If it came to asiege, luck and his boys were in a bad way, and they knew it. They werepenned as well as protected there in that rocky, brushy neck. The mostthat they could do was to discourage any rush from those back in thegrove; as to getting through that grove themselves, and out in the open,there was
not one chance in a hundred that they could do it.
From the outside in to where they were entrenched was just a trifleeasier. The Indiana in the grove were all absorbed in watching the edgeof the Frying-pan and had their backs to the open, never thinking thatwhite men would be coming that way; for had not the other party beendecoyed around the farther end of the big butte, and did not severalmiles and a barbed-wire fence lie between?
So when Applehead and his three, coming in from the north, approachedthe grove, they did it under cover of a draw that hid them from sight.From the shots that were fired, Applehead guessed the truth; thatLuck's bunch had sensed danger before they had actually ridden into theFrying-pan itself, and that the Navajos were trying to drive them out ofthe rocks, and were not making much of a success of it.
"Now," Applehead instructed the three when they were as close as theycould get to the grove without being seen, "I calc'late about the bestthing we kin do, boys, is t' spur up our hosses and ride in amongst 'emshooting and a-hollerin'. Mebby we kin jest natcherlay stampede 'em--butwe've sure got t' git through In' git under cover mighty dang suddent,er they'll come to theirselves an' wipe us clean off'n the map--ifthey's enough of 'em. These here that's comin' along after us, they'llhelp t' swell the party, oncet they git here. I calc'late they figger't we're runnin' head-on into a mess uh trouble, 'n' they don't want t'colleck any stray bullets--'n' that's why they've dropped back in thelast half mile er so. Haze them pack bosses up this way, Pink, so'stthey won't git caught up 'fore they git t' what the rest air. Best useyore six-guns fer this, boys--that'll leave ye one hand t' guide yorebosses with, and they're handier all around in close--work. Air yeready? Then come on--foller me 'n' come a-whoopin'!"
A-whooping they came, up out of the draw and in among the trees asthough they had a regiment behind them. Certain crouching figuresjumped, sent startled glances behind them and ran like partridgesfor cover farther on. Only one or two paused to send a shot at thesecharging fiends who seemed bent on riding them down and who yelled likedevils turned loose from the pit. And before they had found safecovert on the farther fringes of the grove and were ready to meet theonslaught, the clamor had ceased and the white men had joined thoseothers among the rocks.
So now there were nine men cornered here on the edge of the Frying-pan,with no water for their horses and not much hope of getting out ofthere.
"Darn you, Applehead, why didn't you keep out of this mess?" Luckdemanded with his mouth drawn down viciously at the corners and his eyeswarm with affection and gratitude. "What possessed your fool heart toride into this trap?"
"We-ell, dang it, we had t' ride som'ers, didn't we?" Applehead, safebehind a bowlder, pulled off his greasy, gray Stetson and polished hisbald head disconcertedly. "Had a bunch uh Navvies hangin' t' our heelslike tumbleweed--'n' we been doin' some RIDIN', now, I'm a tellin' ye!'F Lite, here, hadn't kep' droppin' one now an' then fur the rest t'devour, I calc'late we'd bin et up, a mile er two back!"
Lite looked up from shoving more cartridges into his rifle-magazine. "Ifwe hadn't had a real, simon-pure go-getter to boss the job," he drawled,"I reckon all the shooting I did wouldn't have cut any ice. Ain't thatright, boys?"
Pink, resting his rifle in a niche of the boulder and moving it here andthere trying to fix his sights on a certain green sweater back in thewoods that he had glimpsed a minute before, nodded assent. "You're durntootin' it's right!" he testified.
Weary looked shining-eyed at Applehead's purple face. "Sure, that'sright!" he emphasized. "And I don't care how much of a trap you callthis, it isn't a patching to the one Applehead busted us out of. He'swhat I call a Real One, boys."
"Aw, shet yore dang head 'n' git yore rifles workin'!" Appleheadblurted. "This yere ain't no time fer kiddin', 'n' I'm tellin' yuhstraight. What's them fellers acrost the Fryin'-pan think they're tryin't' do? luck le's you'n me make a few remarks over that way, 'n' leavethe boys t' do some gun-talk with these here babies behind us. Dang it,if I knowed of a better place 'n' what this is fer holdin' 'em off, I'dsay make a run fer it. But I don't 'n' that's fact. Yuh musta sprung thetrap 'fore yuh got inside, 'cause they shore aimed t' occupy this nestuh rocks theirselves, with you fellers down there in the Fryin'-panwhere they could git at yuh.
"Thar's one of 'em up on the rim-rock--see 'im?--standin' thar, bygranny, like he was darin' somebody t' cut loose! Here, Lite, you spillsome lead up thar. We'll learn 'im t' act up smart--"
"Hey, hold on!" Luck grabbed Lite's arm as he was raising his riflefor a close shot at the fellow. "Don't shoot! Don't you see? Thaf's thepeace-sign he's making!"
"Well, now, dang it, he better be makin' peace-signs!" growled Appleheadquerulously, and sat down heavily on a shelf of the rock. "'Cause Lite,here, shore woulda tuk an ear off'n him in another minute, now I'mtellin' ye!"