CHAPTER V.
THE PHANTOM LINE RIDER.
For several days the weather remained fine, and the cattle were able toget accustomed to their new range and become hardened.
The boys at the sign camps took things easy. In each sign camp were twoboys, one of whom rode days, and the other nights, when it was necessaryin bad weather to hold the cattle from drifting.
In order to keep in touch with one another the riders started from theircamps and met midway between, in order to exchange notes as to thecondition of the cattle and other things necessary to the welfare of thewhole herd.
There was another reason for this constant interchange of communicationbetween the camps.
Ted had received a warning from the town of Bubbly Creek, a small cattlestation, about twenty miles from the Long Tom Ranch, where there was acattleman's hotel, a few saloons, and an outfitting store, to look outfor the Whipple gang, which had its rendezvous in the Sweet GrassMountains.
Fred Sturgis, in the last letter Ted had received from him, had alsomentioned this gang of thieves and desperadoes, whose operationsextended from Canada, into which they made extensive raids when theCanadian Mounted Police happened to be out of that part of the country,as far south as the central portion of Montana.
"I have had considerable trouble with the Whipple gang myself," Sturgiswrote, "but as yet I have never seen but one member of the gang to knowit. I have had plenty of cattle stolen, and have always attributed thethefts to the Whipples. All I know about the gang is that it was foundedby a fellow named Whipple, an outlaw on the scout, who attracted tohimself a desperate gang of fugitives from justice who had taken refugein the Sweet Grass Mountains.
"I have never seen Whipple himself, but from those who claim to know himhe is described as an enormous man of prodigious strength, and a perfectbrute, who has forced his men into absolute subjection by his acts ofbrutality toward them.
"With Whipple are a number of bad Indians, who have fled from thevarious reservations in Montana after having committed all sorts ofcrimes, from theft to murder. It is said that these are more to befeared than the white men, for they are terribly cruel, and when theyget a victim he is tortured with all the horrible rites of the truesavage. They know that the moment they are caught that is the end forthem, so that they are reckless to the verge of insanity.
"I tell you these things, believing that you already know what ranchingin northern Montana means, and with every confidence in Ted Strong'sability to take care of himself, and meet conditions when they appear.All I can say is, go after them if they molest you. I and my boys foughtthem so successfully that they gave us a wide berth toward the end. Butwhen they learn that new hands have taken hold of the Long Tom they maythink that they can start their funny business again.
"Knowing your reputation, and the ability you have shown in the past inwiping out, or at least breaking up and scattering, bands of bad men, Ileave the Long Tom in your hands with the hope that when I take it overagain in the spring there will be no more Whipple gang, and that theSweet Grass Mountains will be as safe as one's own dooryard.
"A word in your ear about the Sweet Grass Mountains: It is known to afew men in Montana, and a few others in various parts of the countrythat somewhere in those mountains are rich mines of gold and copper, andat various times men have brought out beautiful and valuable specimensof sapphires and rubies in the rough, not knowing what they were, havingpicked them up solely because they were beautiful and unusual.
"If it were not for the Whipple gang the mountains would have beenopened up to the prospectors long ago. Several prospectors, unheedful ofthe warnings, have gone in, but none have ever come out of the SweetGrass Mountains.
"Whoever is at the head of the Whipple gang possesses more than theusual share of brains, courage, and luck. Keep your eye peeled, and goodfortune to you."
This letter had been read to the boys one night in camp, and all wereinstructed to look out for strangers on the ranch and to informthemselves of the business of such.
One night Carl started from the sign camp to ride north to meet therider from sign camp No. 2, which lay nearer the mountains.
The camp in which Bud and Carl were stationed was camp No. 1.
The distance between the camps was about six miles, so that each riderhad to go about three miles to meet.
The night was clear and cold, and the air fairly sparkled with the frostin the brilliant white moonlight. It was a glorious night, and Carl, ina leather coat lined with fleece, and with a fur cap upon his head, andhis feet in thick felts, started away from the camp on his ride.
There was no wind, but the temperature was very low.
To the north the Sweet Grass Mountains loomed, a black mass against thesky, while all about the world was carpeted with snow.
Carl had not progressed more than a mile from his camp when he saw adark object against the snow some distance in front of him.
At first he thought it might be a bush or a rock, so still it was in themoonlight.
But he could not remember of ever having seen either a rock or a bush inthat part of the range.
Then he wondered if he was late at the meeting place, and that the otherline rider had got tired of waiting for him, and had ridden forward uponhis line to meet him.
This stimulated him to greater speed, and he pricked up his pony.
But as he got nearer the black blot on the snow there seemed to besomething unusual about it, and he unconsciously slowed his animal downto a walk.
At last he got within hailing distance, and saw that it was a man onhorseback that he had been approaching.
The man on night duty at the second sign camp was a cow-puncher namedFollansbee, a short, reckless, yet amiable fellow, whom Carl knew well.
The rider who was awaiting him was an unusually large man, and bestrodean enormous horse. The two were as if they had been carved from ebony,as they stood silent and absolutely still, outlined sharply against thedazzlingly white background.
Something inside of Carl began to sink as he went on, slower and slower,his hand gripping the reins tightly, and holding back on them.
"Vot it is?" he was saying over and over to himself. "Vot it is? Dot isnot Billy Follansbee. Dot man vould make dree times of Follansbee, nit?"
Cold fear was slowly stealing over Carl, and he wanted in his heart toturn and ride the other way.
But something seemed to draw him forward, and, try as he would, he couldnot bring himself to turn back.
The man on the black horse could not be a member of the Long Tom force,for Carl knew every one of them well, as a fellow will who has campedwith them for months on a cattle drive.
Now Carl was near enough to see the man's face, and he peered eagerlyforward to get a glimpse of it.
Then his heart sank lower yet, for the man's face was as white as thesnow beyond. There were no features; neither nose, nor mouth, noreyebrows, only a pair of black eyes gleamed out of that dead-white face.
Carl clutched at the horn of his saddle to keep from falling, he was sofrightened.
"Vot it is?" he kept repeating to himself.
His pony stopped of its own volition directly in front of this blackapparition, and Carl swayed in his saddle and would have fallen out ofit had he not clung to it with the unconscious strength of despair.
"Iss dot you, Follansbee?" asked Carl, in a weak, thin voice, wellknowing that it was not his line partner, but trying to break the spellof fear that held him.
There was no reply, but the gleaming black eyes never left his own, nordid the figure on the horse move a hair's breadth.
"Vy don't you say someding?" said Carl, his voice sounding like thepiping noise of the wind through a keyhole. "Speak someding."
Then it suddenly struck Carl that the man could not speak, because inthat white, immovable face there was no mouth to speak with, only thoseblack, blazing eyes.
"If you can't speak, make motionings," said Carl, in an imploring voice.
The sinis
ter figure on the black horse slowly raised his arm, andmotioned Carl toward him, at the same time swinging his black horsearound and riding toward the mountains.
Chilled to the heart, Carl obeyed the signal, and sent his pony forward.
The man, apparition, demon, or whatever it was, sent his horse into agallop, and Carl, with no volition on his own part, followed at the samespeed.
But with the black and menacing eyes of the man with the dead face awayfrom his own, some small part of courage oozed back into Carl again, andhe remembered Ted's injunction to question every stranger met on therange, and if he did not give a satisfactory answer to drive him off.
But Carl had not got over the fright the sight of that face and eyes hadthrown him into.
Suddenly his hand came into contact with the handle of his six-shooter,and a thrill of daring ran through him.
He looked ahead at the back of the man riding only a few feet in advanceof him.
Should he take the chance? He knew that Ted or Bud or any of the boyswould do so. Why not he?
If the man was only human a bullet would soon settle the matter. But ifhe should be a ghost or an emissary of the devil, as Carl stronglysuspected, nothing like a ball from a forty-five would do him harm.
This had the effect of staying his hand, and the revolver stoppedhalfway out of its holster.
Then Carl thought of the boys, and what they would say if they knew thathe had not nerve enough to pot the enemy when he met him.
Carl was not the bravest fellow in the world, and he was intenselysuperstitious.
Again the thoughts of the taunts of the other boys, should they everknow that he lacked the nerve to take advantage of the moment, came tohim, and he gulped something hard that rose in his throat, and drew outhis revolver.
At that moment the man in black turned and looked over his shoulder, hisdead face gleaming white, out of which shone those terrible black eyes.
The revolver stopped suddenly in its upward course, and Carl's jawdropped as he stared in abject fear at that white and expressionlessface.
Then the man in black turned his horrible face once more to the fore,and rode on.
Something inside of Carl seemed to snap, and a great glow of courageswept over him. He fairly hated the sight of the grim rider in front ofhim, who was taking him he knew not where, and whom he yet dreaded withall his heart.
Up came the revolver again, and, almost before he realized what he wasdoing, Carl was firing, straight at the back in front of him.
The target could not be fairer, that black mark against the snow.
The first ball struck, for Carl heard the thud of it, as if it hadstruck and sunk into something soft.
The report of the weapon crashed through the still night, and wascarried far on the frosty air, reverberating and echoing back from thedistant mountains.
But the creature in whose body the ball had lodged did not seem to knowit. The head was not turned, the body did not lurch or sway.
Carl, now blind to everything but the terror that had taken possessionof him, fired again and again until every chamber in his revolver wasempty, pausing after every shot to note the effect.
That every shot was fair he was sure, for he could hear the sound of theimpact of the bullet.
The recipient of the bullets seemed not to know that they had beenfired, for he did not hasten or retard the progress of the horse, nordid he take any personal notice that they gave him any discomfort.
But when Carl ceased firing he threw his head backward, looking over hisshoulder again, and from that hideous face without nose or mouth came agurgling noise that was like, and yet not like, laughter.
The laughter was worse on Carl's nerves than the silence, and he felthimself grow sick at heart.
How could he expect to fight or escape from a devil impervious to theballs from a Colt forty-five?
Then, to Carl's amazement and relief, the black horse sprang forwardover the snow so swiftly that it seemed as if it was flying rather thanrunning, but this probably was due to the uncertainty and the illusionof the moonlight, and vanished into thin air, leaving Carl staringopen-mouthed.
It was several minutes before Carl regained his senses and knew that hewas sitting with his revolver in his hand, staring into space and seeingnothing.
Then he rode slowly forward to the brink of a deep coulee.
Here was where he had last seen the phantom rider, for such Carl had atlast come to regard him.
Looking to the bottom of the coulee, Carl saw nothing but snow, where hehad expected to find a dead horse and rider.
"Ach, vot a country," he wailed. "Vy did I effer come to it? Mutter, Ivish you vas here to hellup your Carlos."
Then he heard a groan close at hand and looked about, expecting to seethe phantom rider by his side.
A short distance off lay a black splotch on the snow.
It resembled the prostrate form of a man. Had he, after all, killed hishorrible enemy? Cautiously he rode toward it. It was a man, and not thephantom, and it looked very much like a cow-puncher, for it was clad inleather coat and chaps, and there was a belt filled with cartridges, andin the snow beside it lay a Colt forty-five.
This at least was human, and Carl climbed stiffly from his saddle andbent over it.
He started back with a cry of surprise.
The man in the snow was his line partner, Follansbee.
That he was not dead was evident, for he groaned occasionally.
It was up to Carl to get him to camp as soon as he could, and when hetried to raise the insensible form he was stopped by a gush of bloodfrom a wound in the breast.
But he heard a shot in the distance, then another, and another.
The boys had heard his shots, and were riding toward him with all speed.
Presently he heard the long yell, and in a few minutes Bud Morgan camedashing toward him at top speed, and soon they were joined by KitSummers from sign camp No. 2, and the horror of the night was over forCarl.
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