Kitty parted the tangled shrubbery, and saw her stout companion sprawled on his back, his round blue eyes staring up at her in misery.
“I got jolted off,” he said. “Knocked the breath out of me. But I’m on some kind of cactus and when I move a thousand new stickers get into my back.”
Kitty saw nothing amusing in her companion’s misery. She braced her toes against his, grasped Marshmallow’s wrists and tugged with all her might, but his weight was too much for her.
“Wait, I have it!” she exclaimed.
“Did you mean w-e-i-g-h-t or w-a-i-t?” Marshmallow called after her. There was no situation in the world serious enough to prevent Marshmallow from finding some humor in it sooner or later.
Kitty returned, leading the ponies. She uncoiled from Marshmallow’s mount the lasso which, as a matter of routine equipment, was tied to every saddle.
“Here, you hold onto the end, and I’ll pull the pony ahead,” Kitty directed. “That will jerk you up in one move.”
“Make it a gentle jerk,” Marshmallow warned.
“Come on, Kitty,” the stout youth urged, as soon as he was up. “We’re losing time. We must get help to Dave and Doris!”
Remounting, the pair sped on.
They reached the end of the gully and found themselves within a few rods of the back road whose forks led to the Crazy Bear and G Clef ranches.
“Now, which way is shortest?” Kitty asked.
“Right ahead, the way we are going,” Marshmallow answered. “Come along, Kitty! Step on it!”
The road, rough as it was in an automobile, presented easier going than did the open ground. Side by side now, the girl and the youth swept forward in a cloud of yellow dust.
“Hi—yip-yippee!”
The yell came from behind them.
“Stop! Stop!”
Bewildered and not a little frightened, the couple drew rein. To their ears came the thunder of hoofs.
“Doris and Dave?” Kitty exclaimed hopefully.
“That wasn’t Dave’s voice,” Marshmallow said. “Now it’s up to you, Kitty. Drive to the ranch! Kill your horse if you have to, and I’ll stand here and stall off whoever is after us.”
Before Kitty could make up her mind or complete her sentence the pursuit was upon them. It was but a single rider who galloped down.
“Why, if it ain’t the young folks from Saylor’s!”
The cowboy pulled the bandana dust-kerchief from his nose and mouth and stood revealed as Ben Corlies. And Ben Corlies’ car was in the hollow, next to Moon’s!
“What do you want?” Marshmallow asked curtly.
“Well, now, I didn’t mean to interrupt a twosome,” Ben grinned apologetically. “You-all raised such a dust I thought it was an auto.”
“Then you weren’t looking for us?” Marshmallow queried, doing his best to be haughty. “If not, we’ll just continue on our way.”
“Hey, now!” Ben was serious. “This ain’t no way for old friends to act. I ain’t spyin’ on you young folks. Land sakes, don’t freeze me like this. I didn’t know it was you.”
“Well, what did you stop us for?” Kitty asked wrathfully. “Come along, Marshall!”
“I was lookin’ for that good-for-wolf-bait Charlie Bedelle,” Ben said morosely. “I found him downtown last night, all right, and I drug him home and cooped him up. But he stole my car! Stole it and got away again, and Miss Bedelle gettin’ me to promise I’d keep an eye on him. How them two can be related beats me. A angel and a coyote, sister and brother!
“But you just excuse me and I’m beggin’ your pardon. I’ll keep on trailin’ the boy.”
“Wait a minute, Ben!” Marshmallow shouted.
“Ben, listen! We thought you had doublecrossed us. We saw your car. It’s parked next to Moon’s down in a hollow over there where there is some drilling going on. We thought of course you were with him. We didn’t know the car had been stolen. But listen, Doris is—”
“Back with those crooks, is he?” Ben hissed. “I’ll rope and tie that little—”
“Ben, listen. Doris and Dave are back there. We’re riding for help from the ranch!”
“I can clean up the whole bunch on foot and blindfolded!” Ben stormed. “Where are they?”
“Let me tell you,” Kitty begged. “Just wait a moment, Ben. There is a gully a couple of miles up the road that gets wider and deeper—”
“There’s a million like that,” Ben interrupted. “Sh—sh!” Kitty insisted. “The gully goes on for a long way and then ends in a sort of big bowl, and down in there the men are drilling. Doris’s horse bolted while she was creeping up toward the men. Dave said we must ride for help while he stood by Doris.”
“Better not go home. You’ll give Mrs. Mallow a nervous shock,” Ben said. “The Bedelle ranch is closer, and the fork to it is just a couple of hundred yards ahead. You go there and rouse the boys. I’ll go back—but how’ll I find the gully?” A new sound was noticed by all three at once, and drew their attention skyward.
Winging its way overhead, scarcely two hundred feet above the road, was Miss Bedelle’s airplane.
Ben waved his hat violently, and a flutter of white from the pilot’s cockpit showed that he had been seen by his employer. By violent gestures Ben tried to indicate he was in trouble.
“Neither of you looks a bit like her brother, so she’ll know it isn’t Charlie with me,” Ben said. “So when Miss Bedelle gets to the ranch and finds he is gone, she’ll jump in her car and come out here, see? So I tell you what. You, young lady, wait here or down at the fork, and when Miss Bedelle shows up—no, she may not come after all. You ride to the ranch and Mallow, here, can guide me to the gully.”
Before the plan could be put into execution the drumming of hoofs on the road sounded again, coming closer and closer.
“Here they come, now!” Kitty sighed in relief.
It was only a lone rider that galloped into sight, however, and that was Dave.
He reined his horse to its haunches.
“Ben’s all right, Dave,” Marshmallow cried out. “His car was stolen by the stowaway. Where’s Doris?”
“I don’t know!” Dave snapped. “I’m worried. She disappeared!”
“Did those men grab her?” Kitty cried.
“No, they weren’t near her at all,” Dave replied. “She just vanished—dropped out of sight. Her horse got away from the men and scrambled up the slope. Then all the drillers and Moon got into their cars, so I went back to my pony and rode him up the nearest hill. From there I could see you here, and when I made out three of you, I got the wild idea somehow that Doris had caught her pony and joined you.”
Kitty’s face went white beneath the dust.
“It’s—it’s awful, Dave,” she gulped.
“Worse than that,” Dave muttered. “If anything happened to her—gosh, we shouldn’t have let Doris try that brave stunt of sneaking up behind a bush to get those deeds.”
“Listen here,” Ben declared. “For safety’s sake it’s best we ride in pairs. You two go on to Miss Bedelle’s ranch like I said, and Dave and I will hurry back to where you saw Miss Force disappear.”
“Right!” Marshmallow said briefly. “Come along, Kitty. And if anyone tries to stop us I’ll put up a fight and you streak for the ranch.”
The party split, galloping off in opposite directions, but each to the rescue of the plucky Doris.
CHAPTER XX
On the Trail
“Why didn’t you stick around and look for the lady?” Ben asked of Dave as they galloped along.
“I told you,” Dave responded glumly. “From a distance I saw three riders on the road and I thought she had found her horse and was waiting for me with the others.”
“Trouble is,” Ben mused, “I’m a mechanic, and not no cowboy. I know all the places in three states that a car will carry you to, but once off the roads, I’m lost.”
Ben went on to explain to Dave why he was astride a horse.
> “I don’t think that Charlie Bedelle is in his right mind, that I don’t,” he added. “His sister is the salt of the earth. A squarer, better human don’t tread shoeleather. Then to have an ornery little crook for a brother, ain’t natural.”
“It doesn’t seem that way,” Dave agreed. “But it doesn’t help us out of this fix right now.”
“Shucks, young man,” Ben snorted. “You’ve only got one person to hunt for. I got two. It’s most important to get the young lady, but then I got to track down this bad boy.”
The horses, winded by the prolonged gallop, dropped into a trot. Neither lash nor spur could coax them to more than a canter for a few yards, before they resumed the easier pace.
“If only they had carburetors to tinker with I could get speed out of these nags,” Ben mourned.
Dave smiled in spite of himself, but he was in a fit of depression. The young man blamed no one but himself for permitting Doris to enter upon her desperate try for the stolen deeds.
“If anything happens to her I’ll never go back East,” he told himself. “I’ll become a hermit. I’ll find a cave in the mountains here some place and live on prickly pears and jackrabbits, and I won’t talk to a human being for the rest of my life.” Then, speaking out loud, he asked:
“Are there any caves around here, Ben?”
“Caves? Golly, the hills are honeycombed with ’em,” Ben answered. “Every once in a while some passel of perfessors or another comes out and explores the caves and picks out a lot of bones an’ things, an’ tell how the wild and fee-roc-i-ous cavemen once dwelt in these parts.”
Dave grew more glum. He could not even be a hermit in a cave without having professors routing him out to search for the relics of extinct races.
“The gully is right near here,” he announced. “I—what’s that?”
Ben reined in.
“A horse—and not half travelin’!” he exclaimed. Once more hope surged in the hearts of Doris’s would-be rescuers.
“It’s Doris!” Dave shouted.
“No, that pinto ain’t got no rider,” Ben said, loosening his lasso as the panic-stricken pony dashed into view.
“It’s Doris’s horse, though,” Dave yelled.
Ben twirled the loop of the lariat, and as the animal galloped past flung his rope. The horse leaped into the air as the noose settled around its neck, and came down stiff-legged, plowing up the dirt. It stood quietly, trembling and foaming.
“See, the saddle slipped around underneath,” Ben said, as he coiled the lasso, shortening the distance between the horse and himself. “That’s what set the pore beast crazy.”
As Ben soothed the frightened steed and worked the saddle into place, Dave shook his head quizzically. Could Doris have fallen off?
“Just a moment ago you said you were a mechanic and not a cowboy,” Dave observed presently. “But you roped that horse on the dead run as neatly as could be done.”
Ben blushed beneath his tan.
“I hate to admit it,” he said, “but it’s the first thing I ever lassoed except a fence-post. It was just dumb luck.”
“Then I hope your luck holds and we find Doris unhurt,” Dave exclaimed. “It will have to work fast, that luck of yours. The sun is ducking behind the hills already.”
“Let’s get started, then,” Ben said, taking the now soothed riderless pony into tow, and spurring his own mount forward.
They reached the gully which had led to the fateful adventure.
“This is it, for sure,” Dave said. “See the hoof marks coming out of it?”
Kitty and Marshmallow had left a distinct trail, which Dave and Ben now retraced.
“No use trying to hide ourselves,” Dave said. “I saw the workmen drive off, and anyhow, our riding around must have been plain to anybody watching.”
“This is all part of that unclaimed land that Miss Force said her uncle and some lady friends owned,” Ben observed. “Those crooks must be pretty sure of themselves to begin working on it.”
“Not entirely sure,” Dave said. “Else they wouldn’t be so secretive about it.”
It was slippery going on the down-grade. The lowering sun had passed behind the hills, and the riders found themselves in deepening shadows.
“We must find her before it gets dark,” Dave repeated again and again.
Once he raised himself in his stirrups and shouted Doris’s name.
“Doris—Doris—Do-do-ris-s-s!” the hills answered.
Dave sank back in his saddle, bluer than ever.
“I’m beginning to hate this country,” he said bitterly. “I was in love with it up to this afternoon. But even the hills make fun of us.”
Ben knew how the youth felt, and wisely said nothing.
“The road is right above us here,” Dave spoke again. “Look, that’s where we scrambled down when we first saw the lookout going up the hill yonder.”
“Yes,” Ben said, looking up. “But the road bends sharp left a little ways on, and goes downgrade until it picks up the main stem just out of Raven Rock. I guess you’ve been over—hello!”
At the edge of the arroyo, high above their heads, a bow-legged, wizened little figure was suddenly silhouetted. One hand was raised in command.
Dave’s jaw dropped. It seemed to him as if some ancient gnome had burst out of his mountain lair to take sides in the hunt.
“Hold on, there!” came a shout, in a high, cracked voice. “Hold on!”
CHAPTER XXI
Swallowed Up
Doris had started on her daring raid with full confidence that she would succeed, and came within arm’s length of doing so.
A broad, flat juniper bush was between her and the goal of her adventure.
“That gives just so much more concealment,” she told herself.
Doris paused a moment to make sure that no one was looking in her direction. A juniper bush suddenly sprouting an arm and rifling a coat would be too much of a surprise, even in this surprising country.
Pulling herself to her knees Doris reached forward through the sharp needles of the evergreen shrub. Just then she heard the clatter of hoofs and the crash of dislodged stones rolling down the slope behind her.
Her fingers closed upon Moon’s coat, and in her haste to drag the garment toward her Doris lost her balance and fell forward.
To her amazement the bush did not check her fall and the earth seemed to dissolve into nothingness below her! Forward and downward she plunged into darkness, to land with a thump that momentarily stunned her.
“I feel the way Alice in Wonderland did when she fell down the rabbit’s hole,” was the droll thought that popped into her mind as soon as she recovered her wits.
Sounds of pursuit, however, and shouts and yells from men immediately chased all whimsy from her mind. Doris looked around her, wonderingly.
“Why, that bush must have concealed the entrance to this cave,” she said to herself. “And I’m not the first one to have been in here, either.” What little of the afternoon sunlight penetrated the opening over her head showed the dim outlines of many kegs and boxes.
“Was I seen?” Doris wondered. “How shall I get out of here if no one noticed me?”
She rose to her feet. The hole through which she had fallen was not more than two feet over her head. An empty box, evidently used for the same purpose by the makers of the underground chamber, served as a stepping stone. Cautiously Doris peered over the edge.
The first thing she saw was a large boulder that was obviously used to seal as well as conceal the opening to the cave by the simple expedient of rolling it across the hole. The edges of this, Doris noted, were concreted to bear the weight of the rock. By standing on tiptoe and twisting her neck a little, Doris could see past the rock and into the bowl-like valley.
She saw the front wheels of an automobile and a corner of the lumber pile near the well rigging, but no sign of human life. Then suddenly a man dashed across her line of vision, but whether he was in pursuit of som
ething or being pursued she could not tell.
“Now to get out,” she told herself.
By gripping the edges of the opening and using her elbows as braces Doris managed to get head and shoulders above ground.
“No use, we can’t catch him!”
That sentence, spoken in a gruff voice, sent Doris swiftly back into the shelter of the hole.
“Let’s sit here and see what Moon wants us to do,” another voice said.
“The stowaway—Miss Bedelle’s brother!” Doris whispered to herself. “I know that voice!”
“If Moon’s half the wizard he thinks he is, we ought to strike oil in a couple of hundred feet,” the first speaker said.
“That ought to make us all rich,” came from the stowaway.
“Shucks, Charlie, the money for the oil isn’t a tenth of the fortune,” the other said. “Selling stock to widows—there’s the real profits!”
“Well, he won’t sell much without my help,” young Bedelle boasted.
“Don’t you say that where he can hear you,” the boy’s companion warned. “He has a way of putting those who double-cross him where they won’t bother him no more.”
“Getting rid of me wouldn’t help him any,” the braggart continued. “My sister just about runs public opinion around here. If I coax her into giving me half the ranch with the promise I’ll stay here and farm it, and then turn it over to you birds, why, everybody’ll think she sold out to Moon and he can do what he wants in Raven Rock. Otherwise he has to sneak around like he’s doing now.”
“Don’t forget we’ve the deeds to this land—and nobody can prove ownership,” the bass-voiced one went on. “When the county can be coaxed to put it up for forced sale this is all the ground Moon will need—and you may need less.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that one little plot of ground is all a dead man needs,” the crook’s accomplice said meaningly.
Doris, crouched in the darkness below, felt her blood run cold at the sinister tone in the man’s voice.
“No wonder they wanted to get the deeds,” she thought. “Why, the oil is just under the surface, and they can get at it without any trouble at all. Then they intend to sell stock for ten times what the oil wells are worth!”
The Second Girl Detective Megapack: 23 Classic Mystery Novels for Girls Page 38