The Night Riders: A Romance of Early Montana

“Stay up all night, dear,” he said, “but do not let your father know it.”

To Joe he said: “Joe, if you sleep a wink this night I’ll never forgive you.”

Then he hurried away, satisfied that neither would fail him, and went to the barn. Without a word, almost without a sound, he saddled the Lady Jezebel.

His mare ready, he went and gazed long and earnestly up at the rancher’s house. He was speculating in his mind as to the risk he was running. Not the general risk, but the risk of success or failure in his enterprise.

He waited until the last of the lights had gone out, and the house stood out a mere black outline in the moonlight, then he disappeared within the barn again, and presently reappeared leading his fractious mare. A few moments later he rode quietly off. And the manner of his going brought a grim smile to his lips, for he thought of the ghostly movements of the night-riders as he had witnessed them. His way lay in a different direction from that of his comrades. Instead of taking the trail, as they had done, he skirted the upper corral and pastures, and plunged into the black pinewoods behind the house.

The Widow Dangley’s homestead looked much more extensive in the moonlight than it really was. Everything was shown up, endowed with a curious silvery burnish which dazzled the eyes till shadows became magnified into buildings, and the buildings themselves distorted out of all proportion. Hers was simply a comfortable place and quite unpretentious.

The ranch stood in a narrow valley, in the midst of which a small brook gurgled its way on to the Mosquito River, about four miles distant. The valley was one of those sharp cuttings in which the prairie abounds, quite hidden and unmarked from the land above, lying unsuspected until one chances directly upon it. It was much like a furrow of Nature’s ploughing, cut out to serve as a drainage for the surrounding plains. It wound its irregular course away east and west, a maze of undergrowth, larger bluff, low red-sand cut-banks and crumbling gravel cliffs, all scattered by a prodigal hand, with a profusion that seemed wanton amidst the surrounding wastes of grass-land.

The house stood on the northern slope, surrounded on three sides by a protecting bluff of pinewoods. Then to the right of it came the outbuildings, and last, at least one hundred and fifty yards from the rest, came the corrals, well hidden in the bluff, instead, as is usual, of being overlooked by the house. Certainly Widow Dangley was a confiding person.

And so Tresler, comparatively inexperienced as he was, thought, as he surveyed the prospect in the moonlight from the back of his mare. He was accompanied by Sheriff Fyles, and the two men were estimating the chances they were likely to have against possible invaders.

“How goes the time?” asked the sheriff, after a few moments’ silent contemplation of the scene.

“You’ve half an hour in which to dispose your forces. Ah! there’s one of your fellows riding down the opposite bank.” Tresler pointed across the valley.

“Yes, and there’s another lower down,” Fyles observed quietly. “And here’s one dropping down to your right. All on time. What of your men?”

“They should be in yonder bluff, backing the corrals.”

“How many?”

“Four, including the cook.”

“Four, and sixteen of mine – twenty. Our two selves – twenty-two. Good; come on.”

The man led the way to the bluff. The cowboys were all there. They received instructions to hold the position at the corrals; to defend them, or to act as reinforcements if the struggle should take place elsewhere. Then the two leaders passed on down into the valley. It was an awkward descent, steep, and of a loose surface that shelved under their horses’ feet. For the moment a cloud had obscured the moon, and Fyles looked up. A southwesterly breeze had sprung up, and there was a watery look about the sky.

“Good,” he said again, in his abrupt manner. “There won’t be too much moon. Moonlight is not altogether an advantage in a matter of this sort. We must depend chiefly on a surprise. We don’t want too many empty saddles.”

At the bottom of the valley they found the rest of the men gathered together in the shelter of the scattered undergrowth. It was Fyles’s whole command. He proceeded at once to divide them up into two parties. One he stationed east of the ranch, split into a sort of skirmishing order, to act under Tresler’s charge. The other party he took for his own command, selecting an advantageous position to the west. He had also established a code of signals to be used on the approach of the enemy; these took the form of the cry of the screech-owl. Thus, within a quarter of an hour after their arrival, all was in readiness for the raiders, and the valley once more returned to its native quiet.

And how quiet and still it all was! The time crept on toward the appointed hour. The moon was still high in the heavens, but its light had grown more and more uncertain. The clouds had become dense to a stormy extent. Now and then the rippling waters of the brook caught and reflected for a moment a passing shaft of light, like a silvery rift in the midst of the valley, but otherwise all was shadow. And in the occasional moonlight every tree and bush and boulder was magnified into some weird, spectral shape, distorting it from plain truth into some grotesque fiction, turning the humblest growth into anything from a grazing steer to a moving vehicle; from a prowling coyote to a log hut. The music of the waking night-world droned on the scented air, emphasizing the calm, the delicious peace. It was like some fairy kingdom swept by strains of undefined music which haunted the ear without monotony, and peopled with shadows which the imagination could mould at its pleasure.

But in the eagerness of the moment all this was lost to the waiting men. To them it was a possible battleground; with a view to cover, it was a strategic position, and they were satisfied with it. The cattle, turned loose from the corrals, must pass up or down the valley; similarly, any number of men must approach from one of these two directions, which meant that the ambush could not be avoided.

At last the warning signal came. An owl hooted from somewhere up the valley, the cry rising in weird cadence and dying away lingeringly. And, at the same time, there came the sound of a distant rumble, like the steady drone of machinery at some far-off point. Tresler at once gave up his watch on the east and centred all attention upon the west. One of his own men had answered the owl’s cry, and a third screech came from the guard at the corrals.

The rumble grew louder. There were no moving objects visible yet, but the growing sound was less of a murmur; it was more detached, and the straining ears distinctly made out the clatter of hoofs evidently traveling fast down the valley trail. On they came, steadily hammering out their measure with crisp precision. It was a moment of tense excitement for those awaiting the approach. But only a moment, although the sensation lasted longer. The moon suddenly brought the whole thing into reality. Suspense was banished with its revealing light, and each man, steady at his post, gripped his carbine or revolver, ready to pour in a deadly fire the moment the word should be given. A troop of about eighteen horsemen dashed round a bend of the valley and plunged into the ambush.

Instantly Fyles’s voice rang out. “Halt, or we fire!” he cried.

The horsemen drew rein at once, but the reply was a pistol-shot in the direction whence his voice had sounded. The defiance was Tresler’s signal. He passed the word to his men, and a volley of carbine-fire rang out at once, and confusion in the ranks of the horsemen followed immediately.

Then the battle began in deadly earnest. The sheriff’s men leapt into their saddles, and advanced both in front and in rear of the trapped raiders. And the cowpunchers came racing down from the corrals to hurl themselves into the mêlée whooping and yelling, as only men of their craft can.

The fight waxed furious, but the odds were in favor of the ambush. The clouded sky lent neither side much assistance. Now and again the peeping moon looked down upon the scene as though half afraid to show itself, and it was by those fleeting rays that the sheriff’s men leveled their carbines and poured in their deadly fire. But the raiders were no mean foe. They fought desperately, and were masters in the use of their weapons. Their confusion of the first moment passed instantly, and they rode straight at Tresler’s line of defense with a determination that threatened to overwhelm it and force a passage. But the coming of the cowpunchers stemmed the tide and hurled them back on Fyles’s force in their rear. Several riderless horses escaped in the mêlée; nor were they only belonging to the raiders. One of the “deputies” had dropped from his saddle right beside Tresler, and there was no telling, in the darkness, how many others had met with a similar fate. Red Mask’s gang had been fairly trapped, and both sides meant to fight to a finish.

All this time both Tresler and Fyles were looking out for the leader, the man of all whom they desired to capture. But the darkness, which had favored the ambuscade, now defeated their object. In the mob of struggling humanity it was difficult enough to distinguish friend from foe, let alone to discover any one person. The ranks of the “deputies” had closed right in and a desperate hand-to-hand struggle was going on.

Tresler was caught in the midst of the tide, his crazy mare had carried him there whether he would or no; but if she had carried him thus into deadly peril, she was also ready to fight for him. She laid about her royally, swept on, and reared plunging at every obstruction to her progress, her master thus escaping many a shot, if it left him able to do little better than fire at random himself. In this frantic fashion the maddened creature tore her way through the thick of the fight, and her rider was borne clear to the further outskirts. Then she tried to get away with him, but in the nick of time, before her strong teeth had fixed themselves on the bit, he managed to head her once again for the struggling mass.

With furious recklessness she charged forward, and, as bad luck would have it, her wild career brought about the worst thing possible. She cannoned violently into the sheriff’s charger, while its rider was in the act of leveling his revolver at the head of a man wearing a red mask. The impact was within an ace of bringing both horses and riders to the ground. The mare was flung on her haunches, while Fyles, cursing bitterly, clung desperately to his saddle to retain his seat. But his aim was lost, and his shot narrowly missed his horse’s head; and, before either he or Tresler had recovered himself, the red masked man had vanished into the darkness, heading for the perilous ascent of the valley side.

Terrified out of her life the Lady Jezebel turned swinging round on her haunches, and charged down the valley; and as she went Tresler had the questionable satisfaction of seeing the sheriff detach himself from the mob and gallop in pursuit of the raider.

His own blood was up now, and though the mare had got the bit in her teeth he fought her with a fury equal to her own. He knew she was mistress of the situation, but he simply would not give in. He would kill her rather than she should get away with him this time. And so, as nothing else had any effect on her, he snatched a pistol from its holster and leant over and pounded the side of her head with the butt of it in a wild attempt to turn her. At first she gave not the smallest heed to his blows; such was her madness. But presently she flinched under them and turned her head away, and her body responded to the movement. In another moment he had her round, and as she faced the side of the valley where the raider had disappeared, he slashed her cruelly with his spurs. In a moment the noise of the battle was left behind him, and the mare, with cat-like leaps, was breasting the ascent.

And Tresler only thought of the man he was in pursuit of. His own neck or the neck of his mare mattered nothing to him then. Through him, or through the mare, they had lost Red Mask. He must rectify the fault. He had no idea how. His brain was capable of only one thought – pursuit; and he thanked his stars for the sure-footed beast under him. Nothing stopped her; she lifted to every obstruction. A cut-bank had no terrors for her, she simply charged it with her great, strong hoofs till the gravel and sand poured away under them and left her a foothold. Bushes were trampled down or plunged through. Blindly she raced for the top, at an angle that made her rider cling to the horn of his saddle to keep himself from sliding off over the cantle.

They passed Fyles struggling laboriously to reach the top. The Lady Jezebel seemed to shoot past him and leave him standing. And as he went Tresler called out —

“How much start has he?”

“He’s topping it now,” the sheriff replied.

And the answer fired Tresler’s excitement so that he again rammed both spurs into the mare’s flanks. The top of the hill loomed up against the sky. A thick fringe of bush confronted them. Head down, nose almost touching the ground, the mad animal plunged into it. Her rider barely had time to lie down in his saddle and cling to her neck. His thoughts were in a sort of mental whirlpool and he hardly realized what had happened, when, the next moment, the frenzied demon under him plunged out on to the open prairie.

She made no pause or hesitation, but like a shot from a gun swept on straight as the crow flies, her nose alone guiding her. She still held the bit in her jaws; her frolic had only just begun. Tresler looked ahead and scanned the sky-line, but the darkness obscured all signs of his quarry.

He had just made up his mind to trust to chance and the captious mood of his mare when the moon, crossing a rift in the clouds, gave him a sort of flashlight view of the horizon. It only lasted a few seconds, but it lasted long enough for him to detect a horseman heading for the Mosquito River, away to the right, with a start that looked like something over a mile. His heart sank at the prospect. But the next instant hope bounded within him, for the mare swung round of her own accord and stretched herself for the race.

He understood. She had recognized the possibility of company; and few horses, whatever their temper, can resist that.

He leaned over and patted her shoulder, easing her of his weight like a jockey.

“Now, you she-devil,” he murmured affectionately, “behave yourself for once, and go – go like the fiend you are!”

CHAPTER XXII

THE PURSUIT OF RED MASK

A mile start; it would seem an impossible advantage. Even with a far better horse in pursuit, how many miles must be covered before that distance could be made up? Could the lost ground be regained in eight miles? It looked to be out of the question even to Tresler, hopeful of his mare as he was, and knowing her remarkable turn of speed. Yet such proved to be the case. Eight miles saw him so close on the heels of the raider that there was nothing left for the fugitive but to keep on.

He felt no surprise that they were traversing the river trail. He even thought he knew how he could head his man off by a short cut. But this would not serve his purpose. He wanted to get him red-handed, and to leave him now would be to give him a chance that he was confident would be taken advantage of at once. The river trail led to the ranch. And the only branches anywhere along its route were those running north and south at the ford.

Steadily he closed up, foot by foot, yard by yard. Sometimes he saw his quarry, sometimes he was only guided by the beat of the speeding hoofs. Now that he was urging her, the Lady Jezebel had relinquished the bit, not only willing, but bursting to do better than her best. No rider could resist such an appeal. And as they went Tresler found himself talking to her with an affection that would have sounded ridiculous to any but a horseman. It made him smile to see her ears laid back, not in the manner of a horse putting forth its last efforts, but with that vicious air she always had, as though she were running open-mouthed at Jacob Smith, as he had seen her do in the corral on his introduction to her.

When they came to the river ford he was a bare hundred yards in the wake of his man. Here the road turned off for the ranch, and the trees met overhead and shut out the light of the moon. It was pitch black, and he was only guided by the sound of the other horse in front. Abreast of the ford he became aware that this sound had abruptly died out, and at the bend of the trail he pulled up and listened acutely. They stood thus, the mare’s great body heaving under him, until her rider caught the faint sound of breaking bush somewhere directly ahead of them.

Instantly recollection came to his help, and he laughed as he turned the mare off the trail and plunged into the scrub. It was the spot where, once before, he had taken, unwillingly, to the bush. There was no hesitation, no uncertainty. They raced through the tangle, and threaded their way on to the disused trail they had both traveled before.

The fugitive had gained considerably now, and Tresler, for the first time since the race had begun, asked his mare for more pace. She simply shook her head, snorted, and swished her tail, as though protesting that the blow was unnecessary. She could not do the impossible, and that he was asking of her. But his forcible request was the nervous result of his knowledge that the last lap of the race had been entered upon and the home stretch was not far off. It must be now or never.

He soon realized that the remaining distance was all too short. As he came to the place where the forest abruptly terminated, he saw that day had broken. The gray light showed him to be still thirty yards or so behind.

They had reached the broken lands he remembered so well. Before him stretched the plateau leading to the convergence of the river and the cliff. It was the sight of this which gave him an inspiration. He remembered the branching trail to the bridge, also the wide sweep it took, as compared with the way he had first come. To leap the river would gain him fifty yards. But in that light it was a risk – a grave risk. He hesitated. Annoyed at his own indecision, he determined to risk everything on one throw. The other horse was distinctly lagging. He reached down and patted his mare’s neck. And that simple action restored his confidence; he felt that she was still on top of her work. The river would have no terrors for her.

He saw the masked man turn off for the bridge, but he held straight on. He gave another anxious look at the sky. The dull gray was still unbroken by any flush of sunrise, but it was lighter, certainly. The mask of clouds was breaking, though it still contrived to keep daylight in abeyance. He had no option but to settle himself in the saddle for the great effort. Light or no light, he could not turn back now.

And for the while he forgot the fugitive. His mind centred on the river ahead, and the moment when his hand must lend the mare that aid, without which he could not hope, after her great journey, to win the far bank. His nerve was steady, and his eyes never more alert. Everything was distinct enough about him. The bushes flying by were clearly outlined now, and he fancied he could already see the river’s line of demarkation. On they raced, he leaning well forward, she with her ears pricked, attentive to the murmurs of the water already so near. Unconsciously his knees gripped the leggaderos of his saddle with all the power he could put into the pressure, and his body was bent crouching, as though he were about to make the spring himself.

And the moment came. He spurred and lifted; and the game beast shot forward like a rocket. A moment, and she landed. But the half lights must have deceived her. She had jumped further than before, and, crashing into a boulder with her two fore feet, she turned a complete somersault, and fell headlong to the ground, hurling her rider yards out of the saddle into the soft loose sand of the trail beyond.

Quite unhurt, Tresler was on his feet in an instant. But the mare lay still where she had fallen. A hopeless feeling of regret swept over the man as he turned and beheld her. He saw the masked rider dash at the hillside on his weary horse, not twenty yards from him, but he gave him no heed.

It needed no look into the mare’s glazing eyes to tell him what he had done. He had killed her. The first really honest act of her life had led to the unfortunate creature’s own undoing. Her lean ewe neck was broken, as were both her forelegs.

The moment he had ascertained the truth he left her, and, looking up at the hill, saw that it was high time. The rider had vanished, but his jaded horse was standing half-way up the hillside in the mire of loose sand. It was either too frightened or too weary to move, and stood there knee-deep, a picture of dejection.

The task of mounting to the ledge was no light one, but Tresler faced it without a second thought. The other had only something less than a minute’s start of him, and as there was only one other exit to the place – and that, he remembered, of a very unpromising nature – he had few fears of the man’s ultimate escape. No, there was no escape for him; and besides – a smile lit up the hard set of his features at the thought – daylight had really come. The clouds had at last given way before the rosy herald of sunrise.

The last of the ascent was accomplished, and, breathing hard, Tresler stepped on to the gravel-strewn plateau, gun in hand. He felt glad of his five-chambered companion. Those rough friends of his on the ranch were right. There was nothing so compelling, nothing so arbitrary, nor so reassuring to the possessor and confounding to his enemies, as a gun well handled.

The ledge was empty. He looked at the towering cliff, but there was no sign of his man in that direction. He moved toward the hut, but at the first step the door of the dugout was flung wide, and Julian Marbolt, gun in hand, dashed out.

He came with a rush, without hesitation, confidently; but as the door was thrown open, and the flood of daylight shone down upon him, he fell back with a bitter cry of despair, and Tresler knew that he had not reckoned on the change from comparative darkness to daylight. He needed no further proof of what he had come to suspect. The rancher was only blind in the presence of strong light!

For a second only he stood cowering back, then, feeling his way, he darted with miraculous rapidity round the side of the building, and scrambled toward the dizzy staircase in the rock.

Tresler challenged him at once, but he paid no heed. He had reached the foot of the stairway, and was climbing for life and liberty. The other knew that he ought to have opened fire on him, but the old desire to trust to his hands and bodily strength overcame his better judgment, and he ran at him. His impulse was humane but futile, for the man was ascending with marvelous rapidity, and by the time he had reached the foot of the ladder, was beyond his reach.

There was nothing left now but to use his gun or to follow. One look at the terrific ascent, however, left him no choice.

“Go on, and I’ll drop you, Julian Marbolt!” he shouted. “I’ve five chambers loaded in each gun.”

For response, the blind man increased his exertions. On he went, up, up, till it made the man below dizzy to watch him. Tresler raised his gun and fired wide, letting the bullet strike the rock close to the man’s right hand to convince him of his intentions. He saw the limestone splinter as the bullet hit it, while the clutching, groping hand slid higher for a fresh hold; but it had no other effect.

He was at a loss. If the man reached the top, he knew that somewhere over the brink lay a road to safety. And he was nearing it; nearing it foot by foot with his crawling, clinging clutch upon the face of rock. He shuddered as he watched, fascinated even against himself. Deprived of sight, the man’s whole body seemed alert with an instinct that served him in its stead. His movements were like those of some cuttlefish, reaching out blindly with its long feelers and drawing itself up by the power of its tentacles.

He shouted a last warning. “Your last chance!” he cried; and now his aim was true, and his purpose inflexible.