Produced by Al Haines

THE BOY RANCHERS AMONG THE INDIANS

OR

Trailing The Yaquis

By

WILLARD F. BAKER

Author of "The Boy Ranchers," "The Boy Ranchers In Camp," "The Boy
Ranchers on The Trail," etc.

ILLUSTRATED

NEW YORK

CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY

COPYRIGHT, 1922, BY

CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY

THE BOY RANCHERS AMONG THE INDIANS

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I COMPANY COMING II THE TELEGRAM III "GET READY, BOYS!" IV ON THE TRAIL V ROSEMARY AND FLOYD VI PRISONERS VII INTO THE MOUNTAINS VIII SHOOTING STARS IX A LONE INDIAN X SHOTS FROM AMBUSH XI THE SURPRISE XII FORWARD AGAIN XIII WEARY CAPTIVES XIV SURROUNDED XV WITH THE TROOPERS XVI INDIAN "SIGN" XVII AN ALARM XVIII SEPARATED XIX THE FIGHT XX THE WHITE FLAG XXI THE TRICK DISCOVERED XXII ANXIOUS HOURS XXIII THE LAST STAND XXIV THE RUSE OF ROSEMARY XXV "ALL'S WELL!"

THE BOY RANCHERS AMONG THE INDIANS

CHAPTER I

COMPANY COMING

High and clear the sweet, western wind brought over the rolling hills the sound of singing. At least it was singing of a sort, for there was a certain swing and rhythm accompanying the words. As the melody floated toward them, three young cowboys, seated at ease in their saddles, looked up and in the direction of the singer.

Thus the song.

"Oh, bury me out on th' lonesome prairie!
Put a stone under my haid!
Cover me up with a rope an' a saddle!
'Cause why? My true-love is daid * * * * * *"

It is impossible in cold print to indicate the mournful and long-drawn-out accent on the word "dead," to rhyme with head.

"Here comes Slim!" exclaimed one of the youthful cow punchers to his companions.

"As if we didn't know that, Dick!" laughed the slighter of two lads who, from their close resemblance, could be nothing less than brothers.

"His voice doesn't improve with age; does it, Nort?" asked Bud Merkel, smiling at his cousins, Norton and Richard Shannon.

"But he means well," declared Nort with a chuckle. "Oh, you Slim!" he shouted, as a tall lanky individual, mounted on a pony of like proportions, ambled into view, topping a slight rise of the trail. "Oh, you Slim!"

The older cowboy—a man, to be exact—who had been about to break forth into the second, or forty-second verse of his song (there being in all seventy-two stanzas, so it doesn't much matter which one is designated)—the older cowboy, I say, paused with his mouth open, and a blank look on his face. Then he grinned—that is the only word for it—and cried:

"Well, I'm a second cousin to a ham sandwich! Where'd you fellows come from?"

"We haven't come—we're just going!" laughed Bud. "We're going over to see Dad and the folks. How are they all?"

"Oh, they're sittin' pretty! Sittin' pretty!" affirmed Slim Degnan, with a mingled smile and grin. "How'd you fellows come out with your spring round-up?"

"Pretty fair," admitted Bud. "A few steers short of what we figured on, but that's nothing."

"I should say not!" chuckled Slim. "Your paw was a heap sight worse off'n that."

"Rustlers again?" asked Nort quickly, as he and his brother glanced at one another. They had not forgotten the stirring times when they were on the trail of the ruthless men who had raided Diamond X ranch, and their own cattle range.

"No, nothin' like that," answered Slim easily. "Just natural depravity, so to speak. Some of 'em ate loco weed and others jest got too tired of livin' I reckon. But we come out pretty fair. Just got th' last bunch shipped, an' I'm mighty glad of it."

"Same here!" spoke Dick. "That's why we came over here—on a sort of vacation."

"I reckon some other folks is headin' this way on th' same sort of ideas," remarked Slim Degnan, as he rolled a cigarette with one hand, a trick for which the boys had no use, though they could but admire the skill of the foreman.

"What do you mean?" asked Bud. "Is Dad going to take a vacation? If he does—"

"Don't worry, son! Don't worry!" laughed Slim, as he ignited a match by the simple process of scratching the head with his thumb nail. "Cattle will have to fetch a heap sight more'n they do now when he takes a few days off," declared the foreman. "What I meant was that some tenderfeet individuals are headin'—"

Slim did not finish the sentence for he was nearly thrown from his saddle (something most unusual with him) as his pony gave a sudden leap to one side, following a peculiar noise in a bunch of grass on which the animal almost stepped.

The noise was not unlike that made by a locust in a tree on a hot day, but there was in the vibrations a more sinister sound. And well did Slim's horse know what it indicated.

"A rattler!" yelled Bud, and close on the heels of his words followed action.

He whipped out his .45, there was a sliver of flame, a sharp crack at which the three steeds of the trio of youthful cowboys jumped slightly, and there writhed on the trail a venomous rattle-snake, its head now a shapeless mass where the bullet from Bud's gun had almost obliterated it.

"Whew! A big one!" exclaimed Slim, who had quickly gotten his pony under control again, and turned it back toward the scene of action. It spoke well for his ability that he had not lost his cigarette, and was puffing on it, though the sudden leap of his steed, to avoid a bite that probably would have meant death, had jarred the words from his mouth.

"First of the season," added Bud, slipping his gun back into the holster.

"Are they more poisonous then than at other times?" asked Nort.

"Guess there isn't much difference, son," affirmed Slim. "I don't want to be nipped by one at any time. Much obliged, Bud," he said, easily enough, though there was a world of meaning in his voice. "I shore plum would hate to have to shoot Pinto, and that's what I'd a done if that serpent had set its fangs in his leg."

"Why'd he shoot him?" asked Dick, for he and his brother, though far removed from the tenderfoot class, were not wise to all western ways yet.

"There isn't much chance for a horse after it's been bit deep by a rattler," Bud explained. "Of course I don't say every horse that's bitten will die, but it's harder to doctor them than it is a man. And Slim meant he wouldn't want to see Pinto suffer."

"You're right there, Bud!" drawled Slim Degnan. "They do say this new-fangled treatment is better'n whisky for snake bites, but I don't reckon I want to chance it."

"The permanganate of potash is almost a sure cure for the ordinary snake bite, if you use it in time," declared Bud. "But I don't know that it would work after a fer de lance set his fangs into you. Anyhow I'm glad we haven't anything worse than rattlers and copperheads around here."

"They're bad enough!" affirmed Slim, as he gave a backward glance toward the still writhing form of the big rattler, which was now past all power of doing harm.

The incident seemed to cause the foreman to forget what he had been about to say when his horse shied, and the boy ranchers, by which title is indicated Bud, Nort and Dick, did not attach enough importance to it to cause them to question their companion. Yet what Slim had been about to say was destined to have a great influence on their lives in the immediate future, and was to cause them to ride forward into danger. But then danger was nothing new to them.

"Well, things are right peaceful since we got rid of Del Pinzo and his gang of greasers," observed Slim, as he rode on with the boys down the trail that led to Diamond X ranch, the property of Bud's father.

"But I'm always worrying for fear they'll come back, or we'll have some sort of trouble with our cattle," observed Dick. "It doesn't seem possible that over at our Happy Valley ranch we'll be let alone to do as we please."

"Don't cross a bridge until you hear the rattling of the planks!" paraphrased Nort to his brother. "We're all right so far."

"Yes, things are sittin' right pretty for the present," declared Slim. "Well, here we are," he added, as a turn of the trail brought them within sight of the corrals and other parts of Diamond X ranch. "And there's your folks," he added, as a woman and girl, standing in the yard of a red ranch house, began to wave their hands to the boys.

"I see Dad!" exclaimed End.

"Where?" asked Nort.

"Over by the pony corral, talking to Yellin' Kid. Looks like Kid just came in with the mail."

"He started after it when I rode out to look for a couple of strays," said Slim. "Beckon he jest come back. You boys'll hear more partic'lars now, I reckon."

"Particulars of what?" asked Nort. "Was that what you started to say when Bud shot the rattler?"

Slim did not answer, the reason being that a moment later he was surrounded by a knot of laughing, pushing, jostling and shouting cowboys, who seemed to want the foreman to settle some disputed point.

Bud and his two cousin chums rode on and greeted Mr. Merkel and his wife, who was "Ma" to every cowboy within fifty miles, and Nell, who was Bud's pretty sister.

"Hello, Dad! Hello, Uncle Henry!" was the greeting. "Hello, Sis!"

"Got any pie, Nell?" added Bud.

"For Nort and Dick—yes," the girl answered. "But you won't want pie when you hear—"

"Say, what's all this mysterious news?" broke out Bud. "First Slim starts to tell us and then—"

"Rosemary and Floyd are coming!" merrily cried Nell.

"Rosemary and Floyd?" questioned Bud.

"Your cousins, or, to be more exact, your second cousins," explained
Mrs. Merkel. "We had a letter last week saying they might come on from
California, and now your father has just had a special delivery letter,
saying they're on their way. They'll be here any time."

"Company's coming! Company's coming!" joyously sang Nell, for she was delighted with the news.

"Rosemary and Floyd," repeated Bud, "I don't seem—"

"You haven't seen them in some years," his mother said. "But I'm sure you'll like them."

"Especially Rosemary," laughed Nort, and Nell stuck out her tongue at him.

"Well, I'm glad they didn't come until after the spring round-up," spoke Mr. Merkel, looking at a letter he held. "We'll have more time, now, to be with 'em and show 'em around. I wonder—"

But, as in the case of Slim, he did not finish what he started to say, for there came an interruption, in its way almost as sinister as the whirring of the rattle-snake's tail.

Toward the ranch buildings came the sound of rapidly galloping hoofs, and as they all looked in the direction of the sound they saw, riding in toward them, one of the cowboys.

"It's Old Billee Dobb!" exclaimed Yellin' Kid in a voice that was, as usual, unnecessarily loud. "Looks like rustlers were after him!"

But none rode in pursuit of the veteran cowpuncher, though he was spurring his steed to its utmost.

"They've broke out!" he yelled as soon as he was within hearing distance. "They've broke out! Scatter my watermelon seeds, but they've broke out!"

"What has?" demanded Mr. Merkel. "Our steers?"

"No! The Yaquis!"

"Indians!" snapped out Bud.

"That's them, son! They've broke out—left the reservation, and they're headed this way! Oh, rattle-snakes! Get your guns ready! The Yaquis have broke out!"

The boy ranchers looked at each other and it can not be denied that there was a joyous light in their eyes. Nell shrank closer to her father, and Mr. Merkel reached over and placed his hand in reassuring fashion on his wife's ample shoulder.

"Indians!" murmured Dick. "I wonder—"

"Sure we can help fight 'em!" exclaimed Nort, rightly guessing that this was his brother's question.

CHAPTER II

THE TELEGRAM

While the wind fluttered in his hand the letter from Rosemary, telling of her plans to visit Diamond X with her brother, and while Mr. Merkel looked anxiously at Billee Dobb on his panting steed, a far-off look was in the eyes of the ranchman. Bud thought he knew what his father's air portended, and he was eager to speak, but he, as well as the others, felt the tenseness of the situation, and waited for what might come next.

Nell was about to speak, to voice her gladness that a girl companion was to come to the ranch, when Mr. Merkel remarked:

"How come you heard all this, Bill—I mean about the Yaquis? None of it filtered here until you come up sweating lather!"

"I met one of the deputy sheriffs in town," explained the veteran cow puncher. "He'd just got a telegraph message tellin' him to be on the lookout, as the redskins might be headed this way."

"Whoop-ee!" yelled Bud, flapping his hat down on his pony's flank, thereby causing the animal to leap sideways. "Think of it! Indians! Whoop-ee!"

"It's dreadful!" murmured Ma Merkel. "I don't like to think about it!"

"But, Aunt, we have to think of it if the Yaquis are coming this way," spoke Nort. "We want to think of it to protect you and Nell!"

"That's right!" added Dick, while some of the cowboys grinned at the eagerness and impetuosity of the boys.

"Shucks!" exclaimed Mrs. Merkel, getting back her nerve. "Those Yaquis are nothing more than a lot of Greasers, anyhow. They'll turn home at the first sight of a few of the sheriff's posse. I don't believe I'll worry after all."

"That's right!" shouted Yellin' Kid. "No need to worry when the bunch from Happy Valley joins with the Diamond X outfit! We're a match for all the Yaquis that never washed!"

"Let's don't be too sure of that, boys," cautioned Mr. Merkel. "What more did you hear, Billee Dobb? Is it at all serious? How many of the imps broke loose?"

"That I don't know, there's enough of 'em to make the government take action. Some of the regular troops have received orders to move, and they're on their way now. If there were only a scattered few of the Yaquis, Uncle Sam wouldn't be so anxious. They've raided one Arizona town, I heard."

"They have!" cried Nort, Dick and Bud in a breath.

"Why this must have happened several days ago," exclaimed Mr. Merkel. "The Yaquis are quartered some distance from here, and news doesn't travel as fast as all that. How do you account for it, Billee?"

"Well, the fellow who told me got his information from one of those scavengers," explained Billee.

"Scavengers!" cried Bud.

"Yes, you know—one of them fellers that go up in flyin' machines," explained the old cow puncher.

"Oh, you mean aviators!" exploded Bud, trying not to laugh.

"Well, something like that, yes," admitted Billee. "Word of the rising of the Indians was sent out by wireless, and some of the flying machines were ordered to the border. One of 'em who was flying around here had tire trouble, or something like that, and had to come down. It was from him the boys back in town got some of the news, and the deputy sheriff gave out the rest.

"Oh, the Yaquis are risin' up all right, and they may come out here. I rode over like a prairie fire to let you folks know. We've had trouble enough here at Diamond X and I didn't want any more."

"Much obliged to you, Billee," said Mr. Merkel. "Did you happen to hear what town it was in Arizona that the Yaquis raided?"

"It was La—La—wait a minute now. It was one of those crazy Spanish names. I'll tell you—La—La—La Nogalique—that's it!"

"La Nogalique!" cried Mr. Merkel, and he looked at the letter from
Rosemary.

"That's her!" affirmed the cowboy.

"Why—why!" exclaimed the ranchman, "that's the way they were coming—in their auto! La Nogalique! They might have been there—"

"Who were coming?" asked his wife quickly.

"Rosemary and Floyd; They'd be there just about—when was that raid,
Billee Dobb?" cried Mr. Merkel.

"Last Friday!"

The ranchman whistled.

"That's bad!" he murmured. "Bad!"

"Would Rosemary and her brother have reached there by then?" asked Mrs.
Merkel.

"Just about," her husband replied slowly. "Just about! This looks bad! Boys, we've got to do something! Those Yaquis may just be off on a little harmless jamboree, or they may be excited by a lot of their Medicine Men, or whatever they call 'em! Once let 'em get on the rampage, half Mexicans as they are, and we won't know what to expect! It looks bad! I'm glad the round-up is over. It gives us time. Boys, I think—"

But what he thought Mr. Merkel did not disclose—at least for the time being. The attention of all was again attracted by the sound of rapid hoofbeats, and, looking toward the trail that led to town, a horseman was seen riding toward Diamond X. By the manner of his approach it was easily assumed that he came on no ordinary errand.

"More news of the Indians, or I miss my guess!" murmured Bud.

And while the solitary horseman is rapidly approaching, I will endeavor to imitate his speed in acquainting my new readers with a little of the past history concerning the boy ranchers as they have played their parts in the previous books of this series.

The initial volume is entitled "The Boy Ranchers," and tells how Nort and Dick Shannon went to visit their cousin, Bud Merkel, on the ranch of the latter's father. This ranch, Diamond X, was in a western state, not far from the Mexican border. And, as you know, the Yaqui Indians were, in the main, a tribe of Mexican Redmen, who made their home partly in the Land of Montezuma and partly in Arizona, as best pleased them. Efforts were made by the Mexican Government to keep the Yaquis on a reservation, but the efforts were not always successful.

Mr. Merkel was a ranchman of experience, and planned to have his son follow in his footsteps. This Bud was eager to do, and when his cousins came he saw a chance for them to get into the cattle raising business on their own account.

This they did, but not before they had solved a strange mystery centering about Diamond X. As you may recall, the ranch was named after the brand used to mark its cattle—an X within a diamond outline.

The mystery solved, the boy ranchers turned their attention to other matters, and these are related in the second volume, "The Boy Ranchers In Camp." Mr. Merkel, by using an ancient underground water course beneath Snake Mountain, had brought much-needed moisture to a distant valley he owned, thus making it possible to use it as a place for raising cattle. This new ranch, variously called Happy Valley, Diamond X Second, and Buffalo Wallow, was given in charge of the boys to experiment with. They were allowed to raise cattle on their own responsibility. Without water Diamond X Second was out of the question. And the story in the second book has to do with the efforts of Del Pinzo, a dangerous character, and others, to drive away the boys. There was a fight over water rights, and another desperate fight, involving some strange ancient secrets.

The third book, "The Boy Ranchers on the Trail," deals with the boy ranchers after they have become full-fledged "cow punchers." So successful were they in Happy Valley that they incurred the enmity of Del Pinzo and his followers. Cattle rustlers stole many valuable steers from Bud and his cousins, and it was not until after a desperate encounter that the unscrupulous men were defeated.

Then, for a time, peace settled down over Diamond X and the boys' ranch. The spring round-up was over, and a successful year begun, when the ordinary course of events was interrupted in the manner I have set down in the beginning of this book—by news that the Yaquis had risen.

All eyes were turned on the solitary horseman, who rode fast on the heels of Billee Dobb. As this rider came nearer, it could be seen that a paper fluttered in his hand.

"Special delivery letter, maybe," ventured Dick.

"Maybe," admitted Bud.

"I—I have a feeling that it's bad news," murmured Mrs. Merkel to Nell.

"Maybe not," Bud's sister whispered. "It may be only a rush order for cattle to be shipped.

"All that were fit have been shipped," her mother said. "I'm afraid—I'm afraid—"

With a shower of gravel, scattered by the sliding feet of his hastily-reined pony, the man drew up in front of the group.

"Mr. Henry Merkel here?" he asked, crisply.

"Here," said Bud's father, quietly.

"Got a telegraph message for you. It's from La Nogalique!"

"La Nogalique!" murmured Mr. Merkel. "Oh, I hope Rosemary—"

With a rapid motion Mr. Merkel tore open the yellow envelope.

CHAPTER III

"GET HEADY, BOYS!"

Anxiously the boy ranchers and the others watched the face of the stockman as he read the message. It was rather lengthy, which accounted for the somewhat protracted time it took Mr. Merkel to get at the meaning of the words. But when he had read to the end he passed the missive to his wife, exclaiming, as he did so:

"Couldn't be much worse!"

"Are they killed?" cried Nell, clasping her hands.

"No, but maybe they'd better be," grimly answered her father.
"Rosemary and Floyd are carried off by the Yaquis!" he added.

"How do you know?"

"Does the message say so?"

"Which way did they go?"

These were the questions, fired in rapid succession, by Bud, Nort and
Dick.

"That information's in the telegram," explained Mr. Merkel. "The message is to me from the Sheriff of La Nogalique, or at least from some one in his service, for it's signed with his name. I know him, slightly."

"Did he see Rosemary and Floyd carried off?" Dick wanted to know.

"Not exactly. But wait. I'll read it so you may all hear," said Mr. Merkel, taking the missive from his wife's trembling hand. "Old Hank Fowler didn't try to get it all in ten words so we have a pretty fair idea of what went on. Reckon he knew he didn't have to pay for that message. It come out of the county funds I take it. Listen to this, boys!"

Mr. Merkel read:

"'I regret to inform you that some relatives of yours were carried off in the last raid of the Yaquis here. The Indians came over the border from Mexico and shot up this place (La Nogalique). I was away, but some of the boys give them a fight, and drove them off. But they took with them some guns, cattle, what money they could steal and a young lady and gentleman who claim to know you. The way it happened was this. This young lady, named Rosemary Boyd, and her brother Floyd, came here in an auto, from California. They give it out they were on their way to Diamond X. But they hadn't more than reached town than the Yaquis came in and shot things up.

"'The Indians took this young couple, and it was owing to the pluck of the girl that we knew what happened.'"

"Good for Rosemary!" cried Nell. "How did it happen?"

"I'm coming to it," her father said, having paused to get his breath. It was dry work, talking so much and under the stress of excitement, and Nell had broken in on him.

"'As the Indians were riding away, with this young lady and her brother,'" the message went on, "'she managed to scribble something on a piece of paper she tore from a note book. She tossed it to one of the cowboys who was shot in fighting the Yaquis. He brought the girl's message to me after the fight, when I'd sent some of my men to trail the devils. This is what the message said, and I'm sending the actual message to you by mail. "Get word to my uncle, Henry Merkel, Diamond X Ranch, that Floyd and I are taken. Ask him to send help." That's what the message said and I'm doing as requested. I've sent all the help I can, but the Yaquis got the start on us, owing to the fact that I was out of town with a posse after rustlers. But we'll get that girl and boy back or bust every leg we've got, Mr. Merkel. And you can send on help if you want to and join us.'"

The lengthy message was signed with the name "Hank Fowler," and when the reading was finished, Mr. Merkel glanced around at his listeners.

"These young folks are some kin of yours, I take it?" asked Old Billee
Dobb.

"Sure," assented the ranchman. "More of my wife's than mine, but it's all the same. They were coming here on a visit, coming all the way from California by auto. I thought it was rather risky when they first wrote of it, but my wife says Rosemary is a good driver, and Floyd almost as good."

"Is he a Westerner?" asked Yellin' Kid.

"Not born and raised here," said Mr. Merkel, "but Floyd is no tenderfoot, and as for Rosemary—"

"She's a whole can of peaches! That's what she is!" cried Bud. "To have the nerve to stop and scribble a message to dad when the Yaquis had her and her brother. Clear grit I call that!"

"Sure thing!" assented Nort.

"Gee! I wish I'd been there!" sighed Dick.

"What! To be captured by the Indians and made into sausage meat?" joked Mr. Merkel, for at times they poked a bit of fun at Dick on account of his plumpness. Though, truth to tell, he was now not too stout, and the life of the west had greatly hardened him.

"They wouldn't have caught me without a fight!" he bruskly declared.

"That's right! A fight!" cried Bud. "What are we going to do about this, Dad? We can't let our cousins be carried off this way; can we, fellows?" he demanded of his boy rancher companions.

"I should say not!" was the instant response, duet fashion.

"No, it wouldn't be right for us to sit back and do nothing," agreed Mr. Merkel. "There aren't any too many men available to help out the sheriff. We've got to do our share. Get ready boys!" and he looked at his son and nephews, his glance also roving over his own aggregation of cowboys, most of whom were now gathered in front of the main ranch building of Diamond X.

"Where are we going?" asked Dick.

"On the trail of the Yaquis!" answered his uncle. "We can spare most of the bunch, now that the round-up is over. You don't need many out at your ranch, Bud. Call in all you can spare, and we'll hit the trail!"

"Whoo-pee!" shouted Nort, whirling his horse about and setting it at a gallop down through the corrals.

"This is news!" yelled his brother, following the lead of Nort.

"I only hope we aren't too late!" remarked Bud, when his cousins came back to join him.

"Too late? What do you mean!" asked Nort.

"I mean to save Rosemary—and Floyd. Those Yaquis—they're regular devils when they get on the war path! Oh, I hope we aren't too late!"

It was a hope the others shared.

Rapid action replaced the comparative quiet that reigned during the reading of the telegram. Cowboys rode to and fro, and Bud and his cousins prepared to depart for Diamond X Second to arrange for taking the trail against the Yaquis.

As the boy ranchers rode off down the trail, promising to return as speedily as possible, to join with the bunch from Diamond X, their eager talk over the recent events was interrupted by the noise of shouting.

"What's that?" cried Dick, looking in the direction of the noise. It appeared to come from a swale, or depression among some small, rounded knolls.

"Sounds like a cattle stampede," remarked Bud, urging his pony forward.
"And yet it can't be that."

Nort and Dick followed as soon as they could swing their horses about. The sound of shouting and the thunder of the feet of many animals—horses or steers—came more plainly to the ears of the boy ranchers.

CHAPTER IV

ON THE TRAIL

With Bud in the advance, urging his pony to topmost speed, Nort and Dick followed. Bud shot along the trail, up one rise, down another, all the while coming nearer to the noise which increased in intensity. Clearly something was wrong either among a bunch of Diamond X cattle, or with some of the horses belonging to the ranch outfit. And that some human individual was concerned in the "fracas" was evident by the shouts and yells that, now and then, punctured the air.

"By the Great Horned Toad! Look at that!" cried Bud, when he was within viewing distance.

"He'll be killed!" added Nort.

"No, he's out of it now!" yelled Dick. "But maybe it's the end of him!"

As the three boy ranchers thus gave vent to their surprise, and almost while they were in the act of exclaiming, a ragged figure of a man had shot over a stout corral fence, and had fallen in a heap just on the other side and out of the reach of the teeth and hoofs of a number of half wild cow ponies. The thud of the animals' bodies, as they threw themselves against the fence, in the stoppage of their mad race to get the ragged man, could plainly be heard.

"Whew!" cried Bud, reigning his pony to a sliding stop, as he saw that, for the present at least, the man was safe, though his inert form might indicate serious injury. "That was a close call!"

"What was he doing in that corral?" asked Nort, and his hand, almost by instinct, slid to the handle of his .45 protruding from the holster.

"And who is he?" asked Dick, who had followed his brother's lead.

"That's what we've got to find out," said Bud, who, perhaps from longer association with western conditions, had manifested no inclination to draw his gun. "Guess he'll wait for us," he added, as he slid from the saddle, having ridden close to the prostrate form.

But, even as Bud spoke, and as Dick and Nort dismounted, the stranger rose to a sitting position, rubbed his hand across his forehead, tried to smile at the boys and then, in what would have been a jolly voice under other circumstances said:

"I'm supposed to ask 'Where am I?' I believe, but we'll pass that up, and I'll substitute 'what time is it?' Just as a variation you know," and he actually chuckled. "Not that it matters," he added, as he saw Bud fishing out a sturdy silver watch—the only kind it is safe to carry on a cattle range. "Doesn't matter in the least."

"Then why—" began Nort. But the stranger stopped him with a friendly gesture.

"Don't ask me that!" he begged, smiling broadly, as he scrambled to his feet, thereby disclosing the fact that he was even more ragged as to garments than at first appeared when he was lying down. "Don't ask me that. The question has been fired at me ever since I was old enough to decide whether I'd have butter on my bread or take it in the natural state. It was 'why did I do this'—'why didn't I do that' until, in very desperation I gave up trying to answer. I do now. I don't know why I ask the time. I really don't want to know. There are other questions more to the point. Don't trouble to answer. And please don't ask me 'why' this, that—or anything. Frankly I don't know, and I care less. I am here. Where I'll be to-morrow no one knows, and no one cares. It is my philosophy—the philosophy of a rolling stone. I assure you, gentlemen—"

This time it was Bud who interrupted. There was a look on the face and in the eyes of the young ranchman that his cousins could well interpret. It meant that fooling, nonsense or an evasion of the issue was at an end.

"Look here, stranger," said Bud, and, though his voice was stern it was not unfriendly. "Maybe you are a tenderfoot, but you don't look it, and I reckon you've been around here long enough to assimilate the fact that when a stranger is found among other men's horses that stranger is due to make an explanation."

"My boy, you are right!" laughed the ragged man. "Absolutely and tetotally right! Of course you recognize the fact that I am no longer 'among' your horses. I was, but I am not. I came out, so to speak," and he indicated, by a tumbling motion of his hands, that he had leaped the fence to get away from the half wild ponies.

"That's all right," spoke Bud, his voice still stern. His cousins were leaving this matter entirely to him. "That's all right. But you were among them, and it may be more to our good luck than our good management that you aren't astride one of them now, and riding off. What's your name and where are you from?"

These were vital, western questions.

"You are right in your surmise," said the man, limping toward the boys, and still smiling, which occupation he had not left off since arising to his feet. "If luck had been with me I would have ridden on one of your horses. Not off—far be it from me to do that. But I would have ridden to the nearest ranch, tried to get work and so have paid for the use of the animal.

"However, fate had other things in store for me. I never saw such wild animals! They came at me like so many fiends, and after trying in vain to quiet them, and I may say I have some skill with wild beasts, I thought discretion the better part of foolhardiness, and—made for the fence!"

He chuckled at the recollection.

"Then you weren't going to steal a horse?" asked Nort.

"Far from it, kind sir," and the man bowed with just the slightest suggestion of mockery, at which Bud frowned. "I am a lone traveler, and I sought help on my way—help for which I would have paid in work."

"Who are you?" snapped out Bud.

"I have told you my name," said the stranger, in gentle contrast to Bud's harsh tone. "Rolling Stone, at your service," and he bowed again, this time with no trace of mockery.

"Rolling Stone!" ejaculated Nort.

"That isn't a name," complained Bud, but his voice had lost some of its stern quality, and his lips trembled on the verge of a smile.

"I realize that it is more a state of being, or a quality," the man admitted. "But it happens to be a sort of paraphrase of my title. I am Roland Stone, at your service, but my taste, inclination and the action of disheartened friends has fastened the other appellation on me. Rolling Stone I am by name and by nature."

He said it in a way that left little room for doubt, and the boy ranchers seemed to realize this. They could understand how such a character could easily change Roland into "Rolling," if such was his nature. And "Stone" was a common enough name.

"All right, Mr. Rolling Stone," said Bud. "If that's your choice it still leaves the other question unanswered. Where are you from?"

"Everywhere and anywhere, which is to say nowhere," came the reply. "You need only to look at me to tell what I am—a happy-go-lucky individual, a tramp, a hobo, and yet I am willing to work when the spirit is on me. I never stole a dollar or a dollar's worth in all my life. I have harmed neither man, woman or child. I am my own worst enemy, and I am—frankly—hungry! If you will give me food I'll pay for it in work to the best of my ability—"

"You said you had some skill with wild animals," interrupted Bud. "Do you mean—"

"I don't mean horses, if you will excuse the interruption," the man said. "There is my one failing. I used to be with a circus, and the lion and I were good friends. Perhaps some taint of the wild beast odor clings to me, which causes horses to rear up and tear. Or else—"

"That didn't cause these ponies to act that way," laughed Bud, who, with his cousins, was rapidly forming a liking for the stranger. "They're half wild themselves. Just in off the range, and they haven't been broken yet. I doubt if Yellin' Kid would tackle one. It isn't anything to your discredit that you got out in a hurry. But you say you're hungry?"

That was an appeal which never went unheeded in the west.

"Mightily hungry, fair sir!" and, though Rolling Stone smiled, there was an appealing note in his voice. "The last meal I had for nothing was given me by Hank Fowler."

"Hank Fowler!" cried Bud.

"The sheriff?" added Nort.

"Who sent on to Mr. Merkel the message from Rosemary?" completed Dick.

"Rosemary—that's for remembrance," quoted Rolling Stone with a smile. "I know her not, and yet Hank Fowler is a sheriff to my certain knowledge."

"Do you mean the one from La Nogalique?" persisted Bud.

"That same. I appealed to him when I was down on my luck, as I nearly always am, and he befriended me. I have known him for years."

"Then there can't be much wrong with you," decided Bud. "If you want work, my father can fix you up. We'll need some extra hands if we pull out a lot to take the trail after the Yaquis. So—"

"Excuse me, young man. But did you say—Yaquis?" asked Rolling
Stone, and there was a new and eager note in his voice.

"Yes," supplemented Nort. "The Yaquis—Indians you know—have gone wild again and they've raided a town and carried off some of our friends. We're going to—"

"You can't tell me anything about the Yaquis that I don't know, young man!" exclaimed Rolling Stone, and he seemed imbued with new life. "I know they're Indians, of a sort, though a very rotten sort. They killed my best friend years ago. I haven't heard anything about a raid lately. Been too lazy to look for news, I reckon. But if it's true that they're on the rampage, and you're on the trail after them let me, I beg of you, have a hand in it. I asked for work just now. Change that to a fight and I'm with you at the fall of the hat and until I drop! Let me come! Let me help pay back the debt I have against these infernal Yaquis. Will you?" he asked eagerly.

Bud looked at his cousins. Here was a new element. And with all his light manner, and ragged clothes, there was something very satisfying about Rolling Stone, as he asked to be called.

"We'll need all the help we can get," said Bud, slowly. "If Hank Fowler says you're all right, that goes with us. Sure it isn't Hank Fisher who vouches for you?" he asked sharply.

"Hank Fisher—I don't know the man," was the answer.

"You're better off not to," spoke Bud grimly, for Fisher was a ranchman of unsavory reputation, who was believed to have figured in more than one affair with the half breed Del Pinzo, to the discomfort of Diamond X.

"Hank Fowler, the sheriff, will tell you I'm straight," said Rolling
Stone. "I don't say I haven't faults," he went on. "But when I say
I'm my own worst enemy I've spilled an earful," and he laughed genially.

"We'll let it go at that," Bud answered. "If Mr. Fowler says you're on the level that's sufficient. And you can come with us."

"Thanks," was the laconic reply. "Will one of your ponies carry double?" and he looked over his shoulder at the corral.

"We won't ask you to ride one of those mustangs," laughed Bud. "And
it's too much to double up. I'll go back and get one of dad's ponies.
It isn't far. You stay here," he added to his cousins and Rolling
Stone. "I'll be back soon."

Riding rapidly, Bud was quickly back at Diamond X. He told the story of the meeting with Rolling Stone. At first Mr. Merkel was a bit suspicious, but it happened that one of the cowboys had heard of Rolling Stone, and knew him to be what he laid claim to.

"I reckon he's all right," assented the ranchman. "Take him with you, Bud. You'll need help, and if he knows anything about the Yaquis he'll be of value."

"All right," remarked Bud. "He's on. What horse can I take for him?"

One was selected. Together the boy ranchers and Rolling Stone rode out to Happy Valley, for certain matters must be adjusted there before the start could be made after the Indians who had carried off Rosemary and Floyd.

Work went on at top speed, and a day later our young heroes, with Rolling Stone, better dressed, but the same unconventional spirit, started forth.

"On the trail!" grimly remarked Bud as they started to join forces with those from Diamond X.

"On the trail!" echoed Nort and Dick.

"And we can't meet with those Yaquis any too soon for me!" added
Rolling Stone.

"You seem to have it in for them rather hard," observed Dick.

"It can't be any too hard," answered the man with a grim tightening of the muscles around his mouth. "When I think of all they did—"

He paused and gazed at the distant horizon. That there was a story connected with his hate of the Yaquis none of the boys doubted, and they were eager to hear it. But this was not the time and place. Too much remained to be done, and there was too little time in which to do it.

"I wonder when we'll meet up with the imps?" spoke Nort, as they ambled easily along.

"No telling," said Bud. "We've got things in shape back there so that we can remain away all summer if need be," and he glanced back toward their ranch which they had just left. "But I'd like to clean up this bunch of 'onery' Yaquis, and then get back on the job. Cattle raising is our business."

"But just now we're following a side line of rescuing Rosemary and
Floyd," observed Nort. "And I think we can do it!"

Well it was that Fate veiled the Future.

CHAPTER V

ROSEMARY AND FLOYD

"Floyd, I don't like this a bit!"

"What's the matter, Rosemary?"

The young man driving the sturdy little sport model of a car brought the machine to a stop and glanced at the girl sitting beside him. There was a quizzical smile on his face, a good-natured smile, however.

"What don't you like, Rosemary?" he asked again, and there was not in his tone any air of bored fault-finding such as seems to come natural to some brothers in appealing from a decision of some sisters.

"I don't like the way this trail is shaping up, if you'll excuse my
English," answered Rosemary Boyd.

"Your English is perfectly excusable, Rosemary," retorted Floyd. "In fact I rather like it. It is much better than this trail, to be frank."

"Are you sure we have come the right road?"

"As sure as I can be of anything in this doggoned country, where they haven't enough sign posts. I took the turns they told me to take in the last town we passed through, and all the land marks have run true to form so far."

"But we're a good ways from Uncle Henry's ranch yet; aren't we, Floyd?" and there crept into the voice of Rosemary an anxious note.

"Well, maybe we are, but what do we care for a few hundred miles?"

He laughed merrily, showing a set of white, even teeth, and his jollity was so catching that his sister had to join in.

"Well, I suppose it really doesn't make much difference," she said. "We're out for a lark and we've had it, so far. Only I don't seem to fancy sleeping out in the open again to-night. We were lost yesterday, you remember, and didn't make the town we expected to."

Floyd seemed to be waiting for something.

"Well?" he suggested. "Why don't you add that it was all my fault."

"I was going to leave that out," Rosemary said.

"But I'll admit it," acknowledged her brother. "I did pull a bloomer, as an Englishman would say, and I don't intend to do it again to-day. I admit I shouldn't have tried to do more than a day's trip yesterday. If I had taken your advice and stayed in the town where there was at least an apology for a hotel, you'd have had a better night's sleep."

"Well, I didn't mind being out in the open so much, after I got used to the howling of those wolves," Rosemary remarked.

"Coyotes—coyotes—not wolves, though they're off the same piece of goods," corrected Floyd.

"Well, never mind the lesson in natural history," laughed Rosemary. "The point at issue is that I don't like the sort of country we're getting into. It doesn't look to me as though this could ever lead us to Uncle Henry's ranch, and I'm anxious to get there. Bud's mother wrote that he and his cousins, Nort and Dick, had such exciting times, that I'm anxious to join them."

"So'm I," said Floyd. "And we'll get there."

"Not on this trail!" declared his sister, as her brother was about to start the car. "You're getting into a worse and wilder country all the while. I think we should have taken the left turn a ways back."

"The cow puncher we asked told us to take the right turn, and I did," retorted Floyd.

"Cow puncher!" exclaimed his sister scornfully, "He looked more like a renegade Mexican than a real American cowboy. And his accent was Spanish, too."

"Oh, well, lots of good American cowboys came from Mexican or Spanish people, and speak both languages," asserted Floyd. "Don't hold that against him."

"I don't," said Rosemary. "But I will hold it against him if he has put us on the wrong trail, and I'm beginning to believe that's what he did. And maybe purposely, Floyd."

"Purposely? What do you mean?"

"Well, you know what we were told when we started out to make this trip—that we had better take the most civilized and best traveled trails, as the Yaquis were reported to be on the verge of making an outbreak."

"Yes, and for that reason I kept well away from the border. But we aren't anywhere near the Yaquis country now."

"Aren't we?" asked Rosemary, with a strange quietness in her voice.

"No, of course not!" snapped Floyd. It was the first time, since brother and sister had started from California, to make a somewhat adventurous trip to their uncle's ranch that they had been near a "break" in their cordial relations. "The Yaquis are five hundred miles from here."

"I hope so, I surely do hope so!" murmured Rosemary, in such fervent tones that her brother felt an uneasy sense of fear creeping into his heart. For the first time he began to realize that perhaps they had done a foolhardy thing in making this trip alone. He slipped his hand into his pocket, making sure that his gun was in readiness. And it did not relieve his anxiety to note that Rosemary did the same.

Brother and sister were of the west. They were brave and bold and not afraid of danger when they had half a chance to meet it face to face. But they had heard much of the treacherous and mean nature of the Yaquis Indians. These were not like the early American tribes of redmen, who had something of a code of honor in their warfare, cruel and heartless as it seemed at times.

"Well, do you want to go back?" asked Floyd, as he slowly started the car.

Rosemary considered for a moment.

"Let's look at the map and go over what we were told along the route," she suggested.

Then followed a careful scanning of papers and drawings, with the result that Rosemary said:

"I guess we may as well go on. It's a long way back to the nearest town, and this map does seem to indicate that we are heading for La Nogalique."

"That's what I say!" chimed in Floyd. "I only hope La Nogalique is better than it sounds. If we can put up there for the night you'll get a little rest, and maybe I'll have this carburetor adjusted. I don't like the way it's acting."

"Oh, good, sweet, kind carburetor, don't go back on us now!" implored
Rosemary, kissing her hand toward the engine of the car. "Be nice and
I'll sprinkle you with violet talcum powder when we get to Uncle
Henry's!"