Frances of the Ranges: or, The Old Ranchman's Treasure

“Not tobacco,” thought Frances Rugley, with decision. “He’s built a campfire. He is going to stay here for a time. What for, I wonder? Is he expecting to meet somebody?”

This Cottonwood Bottom, as it was called, was on the Bar-T range. Nobody really had business here save the ranch employees. The trail to the hacienda was not a general road to any other ranch or settlement. It was curious that this lone man should come here and make camp.

She came in sight of him ere long. He had kindled a small fire, over which already was a battered tin pot in which coffee beans were stewing. The rank flavor was wafted through the grove.

His scrubby pony was grazing, hobbled. The man’s flapping hat brim hid his face; but Frances knew him.

It was Pete, the man who had been orderly at the Soldiers’ Home, at Bylittle, Mississippi, and who had frankly owned to coming to the Panhandle for the purpose of robbing Captain Dan Rugley.

The girl of the ranges was much puzzled what to do in this emergency. Should she creep away, ride Molly hard back to the ranch-house, arouse Sam and some of the faithful punchers, and with them capture this ne’er-do-well and run him off the ranges?

That seemed, on its face, the more sensible if the less romantic thing to do. Yet the very publicity attending such a move was against it.

The suspicion that Captain Rugley had a treasure hidden away in the old Spanish chest was not a general one. It might have been lazily discussed now and then over some outfit’s fire when other subjects of gossip had “petered out,” to use the punchers’ own expression.

But it was doubtful if even Ratty M’Gill believed the story. Frances had heard him scoff at the man, Pete, for holding such a belief.

If she attempted to capture this tramp by the fire, making the affair one of importance, the story of the Spanish treasure chest would spread over half the Panhandle.

“What the boys didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them!” Frances told herself, and she would not ask for help. She had already laid her plans and she would stick to them.

And while she hesitated, discussing these things in her mind, a figure afoot came down the slope toward the ford and the campfire. It was Ratty M’Gill, walking as though already footsore, and with his saddle and accoutrements on his shoulder.

The high-heeled boots worn by cowpunchers are not easy footwear to walk in. And a real cattleman’s saddle weighs a good bit! Ratty flung down the leather with a grunt, and dropped on the ground beside the fire.

“What’s the matter with you?” growled the man, Pete. “Been pulling leather?”

“There ain’t no hawse bawn can make me git off if I don’t want,” returned Ratty M’Gill, sharply. “I got canned.”

“Fired?”

“Yep. And by that snip of a gal,” and he said it viciously.

“Ain’t you man enough to have a pony of your own?”

“Sam wouldn’t sell me one–the hound! Nor I didn’t have no money to spare for a mount, anyway. I’d rustle one out of the herd if the wranglers hadn’t drove ’em all up the other way las’ night. And I said I’d come over here to see you again.”

“What else?” demanded Pete, suspiciously. He seemed to know that Ratty had not come here to the ford for love of him.

“Wal, old man! I tried to go to headquarters. Went in to see the Cap. Nothing doing. If the gal had canned me, that was enough. So he said, and so Sam Harding said. I’m through at the Bar-T.”

“That’s a nice thing,” snarled Pete. “And just as I got up a scheme to use you there!”

“Mebbe you can use me now,” grunted Ratty.

“I–don’t–know.”

“Oh, I seen something that you’d like to know about.”

“What is that?” asked Pete, quickly.

“The old Cap has taken a tumble to himself. Guess he was put wise by what happened the other night–you know. He’s going to send the chest to the Amarillo bank.”

“What?”

“That’s so,” said Ratty, with his slow drawl, and evidently enjoying the other’s discomfiture.

“How do you know?” snapped Pete.

“Seed it. Standing all corded up and with a tag on it, right in the hall. Knowed Sam was going to get ready a four-mule team for Amarillo to-morrow morning. The gal’s going with it, and Mack Hinkman to drive. Good-night! if there’s treasure in that chest, you’ll have to break into the Merchants’ and Drovers’ Bank of Amarillo to get at it–take that from me!”

Pete leaned toward him and his hairy hand clutched Ratty’s knee. What he said to the discharged employee of the Bar-T Ranch Frances did not hear. She had, however, heard enough. She was worried by what Ratty had said about his interview with Captain Rugley. Her father should not have been disturbed by ranch business just then.

The girl crept back through the grove, found Molly where she had left her, and soon was a couple of miles away from the ford and making for the ranch-house at Molly’s very best pace.

She found her father not so much excited as she had feared. Ratty had forced his way into the stricken cattleman’s room and done some talking; but the Captain was chuckling now over the incident.

“That’s the kind of a spirit I like to see you show, Frances,” he declared, patting her hand. “If those punchers don’t do what you tell ’em, bounce ’em! They’ve got to learn what you say goes–just as though I spoke myself. And Ratty M’Gill never was worth the powder to blow him to Halifax,” concluded the ranchman, vigorously.

Frances was glad her father approved of her action. But she did not believe they were well rid of Ratty just because he had started for Jackleg Station.

She had constantly in mind Ratty and the man, Pete, with their heads together beside the campfire; and she wondered what villainy they were plotting. Nevertheless, in the face of possible danger, she went ahead with her scheme of starting for Amarillo in the morning. And, as Ratty had said, the chest, burlapped, corded, and tagged, stood in the main hall of the ranch-house, ready for removal.

CHAPTER XVI

A FRIEND INSISTENT

It was a long way to the Peckham ranch-house, at which Frances meant to make her first night stop. The greater part of the journey would then be over.

The second night she proposed to stay at the hotel in Calas, a suburb of Amarillo. Her errands in the big town would occupy but a few hours, and she expected to be back at Peckham’s on the third evening, and at home again by the end of the fourth day.

She was troubled by the thought of being so long away from her father’s side; but he was on the mend again and the doctor had promised to see him at least once while she was away from the ranch.

Her reason she gave for going to Amarillo was business connected with the forthcoming pageant, “The Panhandle: Past and Present.” This explanation satisfied her father, too–and it was true to a degree.

She heard from the chaplain of the Bylittle Soldiers’ Home the day before she was to start on her brief journey, and she sent José Reposa with a long prepaid telegraph message to the station, arranging for a private car in which Jonas P. Lonergan was to travel from Mississippi to the Panhandle. She hoped the chaplain would come with him. About the ex-orderly of the home the letter said nothing. Perhaps Mr. Tooley had overlooked that part of her message.

Captain Rugley was delighted that his old partner was coming West; the announcement seemed to have quieted his mind. But he lay on his bed, watching the corded chest, with his gun hanging close at hand.

That is, he watched one of the corded and burlapped chests. The secret of the second chest was known only to Frances herself and the two Chinamen. Anybody who entered the great hall of the hacienda saw that one, as Ratty had, standing ready for removal. The one in Captain Rugley’s room was covered by the blanket and looked like an ordinary divan.

Frances believed San Soo and Ming were to be trusted. But to Silent Sam she left the guarding of the ranch-house during her absence.

Day was just beginning to announce itself by faint streaks of pink and salmon color along the eastern horizon, when the four-mule wagon and Frances’ pony arrived at the gate of the compound. The two Chinamen, Sam himself, and Mack Hinkman, the driver, had all they could do to carry the chest out to the wagon.

Frances came out, pulling on her gantlets. She had kissed her father good-bye the evening before, and he was sleeping peacefully at this hour.

“Have a good journey, Miss Frances,” said Sam, yawning. “Look out for that off mule, Mack. Adios.”

The Chinamen had scuttled back to the house. Frances was mounted on Molly, and the heavy wagon lurched forward, the mules straining in the collars under the admonition of Mack’s voice and the snap of his bullwhip.

The wagon had a top, and the flap at the back was laced down. No casual passer-by could see what was in the vehicle.

Frances rode ahead, for Molly was fresh and was anxious to gallop. She allowed the pinto to have her head for the first few miles, as she rode straight away into the path of the sun that rose, red and jovial-looking, above the edge of the plain.

A lone coyote, hungry after a fruitless night of wandering, sat upon its haunches not far from the trail, and yelped at her as she passed. The morning air was as invigorating as new wine, and her cares and troubles seemed to be lightened already.

She rode some distance ahead of the wagon; but at the line of the Bar-T she picketed Molly and built a little fire. She carried at her saddle the means and material for breakfast. When the slower moving mule team came up with her there was an appetizing odor of coffee and bacon in the air.

“That sure does smell good, Ma’am!” declared Mack. “And it’s on-expected. I only got a cold bite yere.”

“We’ll have that at noon,” said Frances, brightly. “But the morning air is bound to make one hungry for a hot drink and a rasher of bacon.”

In twenty minutes they were on the trail again. Frances now kept close to the wagon. Once off the Bar-T ranges she felt less like being out of sight of Mack, who was one of the most trustworthy men in her father’s employ.

He was not much of a talker, it was true, so Frances had little company but her own thoughts; but they were company enough at present.

As she rode along she thought much about the pageant that was to be held at Jackleg; many of the brightest points in that entertainment were evolved by Frances of the ranges on this long ride to the Peckham ranch.

There were several breaks in the monotony of the journey. One was when another covered wagon came into view, taking the trail far ahead of them. It came from the direction of Cottonwood Bottom, and was drawn by two very good horses. It was so far ahead, however, that neither Frances nor Mack could distinguish the outfit or recognize the driver.

“Dunno who that kin be,” said Mack, “’nless it’s Bob Ellis makin’ for Peckham’s, too. I learned he was going to town this week.”

Bob Ellis was a small rancher farther south. Frances was doubtful.

“Would Ellis come by that trail?” she queried. “And why doesn’t he stop to pass the time of day with us?”

“That’s so!” agreed Mack. “It couldn’t be Bob, for he’d know these mules, and he ain’t been to the Bar-T for quite a spell. I dunno who that kin be, then, Miss Frances.”

Frances had had her light fowling-piece put in the wagon, and before noon she sighted a flock of the scarce prairie chickens. Away she scampered on Molly after the wary birds, and succeeded, in half an hour, in getting a brace of them.

Mack picked and cleaned the chickens on the wagon-seat. “They’ll help out with supper to-night, if Miz’ Peckham ain’t expectin’ company,” he remarked.

But they were not destined to arrive at the Peckham ranch without an incident of more importance than these.

It was past mid-afternoon. They had had their cold bite, rested the mules and Molly, and the latter was plodding along in the shade of the wagon-top all but asleep, and her rider was in a like somnolent condition. Mack was frankly snoring on the wagon-seat, for the mules had naught to do but keep to the trail.

Suddenly Molly lifted her head and pricked her ears. Frances came to herself with a slight shock, too. She listened. The pinto nickered faintly.

Frances immediately distinguished the patter of hoofs. A single pony was coming.

The girl jerked Molly’s head around and they dropped back behind the wagon which kept on lumberingly, with Mack still asleep on the seat. From the south–from the direction of the distant river–a rider came galloping up the trail.

“Why!” murmured Frances. “It’s Ratty M’Gill!”

The ex-cowboy of the Bar-T swung around upon the trail, as though headed east, and grinned at the ranchman’s daughter. His face was very red and his eyes were blurred, and Frances feared he had been drinking.

“Hi, lady!” he drawled. “Are ye mad with me?”

“I don’t like you, M’Gill,” the girl said, frankly. “You don’t expect me to, do you?”

“Aw, why be fussy?” asked the cowboy, gaily. “It’s too pretty a world to hold grudges. Let’s be friends, Frances.”

Frances grew restive under his leering smile and forced gaiety. She searched M’Gill sharply with her look.

“You didn’t gallop out of your way to tell me this,” she said. “What do you want of me?”

“Oh, just to say how-de-do!” declared the fellow, still with his leering smile. “And to wish you a good journey.”

“What do you know about my journey?” asked Frances, quickly.

But Ratty M’Gill was not so much intoxicated that he could be easily coaxed to divulge any secret. He shook his head, still grinning.

“Heard ’em say you were going to Amarillo, before I went to Jackleg,” he drawled. “Mighty lonesome journey for a gal to take.”

“Mack is with me,” said Frances, shortly. “I am not lonely.”

“Whew! I bet that hurt me,” chuckled Ratty M’Gill. “My room’s better than my comp’ny, eh?”

“It certainly is,” said the girl, frankly.

“Now, you wouldn’t say that if you knowed something that I know,” declared the fellow, grinning slily.

“I don’t know that anything you may say would interest me,” the girl replied, sharply, and turned Molly’s head.

“Aw, hold on!” cried Ratty. “Don’t be so abrupt. What I gotter say to you may help a lot.”

But Frances did not look back. She pushed Molly for the now distant wagon. In a moment she knew that Ratty was thundering after her. What did he mean by such conduct? To tell the truth, the ranchman’s daughter was troubled.

Surely, the reckless fellow did not propose to attack Mack and herself on the open trail and in broad daylight? She opened her lips to shout for the sleeping wagon-driver, when a cloud of dust ahead of the mules came into her view.

She heard the clatter of many hoofs. Quite a cavalcade was coming along the trail from the east. Out of the dust appeared a figure that Frances had learned to know well; and to tell the truth she was not sorry in her heart to see the smiling countenance of Pratt Sanderson.

“Hold on, Frances! Ye better listen to me a minute!” shouted the ex-cowboy behind her.

She gave him no attention. Molly sprang ahead and she met Pratt not far from the wagon. He stopped abruptly, as did the girl of the ranges. Ratty M’Gill brought his own mount to a sudden halt within a few yards.

“Hello!” exclaimed Pratt. “What’s the matter, Frances?”

“Why, Pratt! How came you and your friends to be riding this way?” returned the range girl.

She saw the red coat of the girl from Boston in the party passing the slowly moving wagon, and she was not at all sure that she was glad to see Pratt, after all!

But the young man had seen something suspicious in the manner in which Ratty M’Gill had been following Frances. The fellow now sat easily in his saddle at a little distance and rolled a cigarette, leering in the meantime at the ranch girl and her friend.

“What does that fellow want?” demanded Pratt again.

“Oh, don’t mind him,” said Frances, hurriedly. “He has been discharged from the Bar-T – ”

“That’s the fellow you said made the steers stampede?” Pratt interrupted.

“Yes.”

“Don’t like his looks,” the Amarillo young man said, frankly. “Glad we came up as we did.”

“But you must go on with your friends, Pratt,” said Frances, faintly.

“Goodness! there are enough of them, and the other fellows can get ’em all back to Mr. Bill Edwards’ in time for supper,” laughed Pratt. “I believe I’ll go on with you. Where are you bound?”

“To Peckham’s ranch,” said Frances, faintly. “We shall stop there to-night.”

The rest of the party passed, and Frances bowed to them. Sue Latrop looked at the ranch girl, curiously, but scarcely inclined her head. Frances felt that if she allowed Pratt to escort her she would make the Boston girl more of an enemy than she already felt her to be.

“We–we don’t really need you, Pratt,” said Frances. “Mack is all right – ”

“That fellow asleep on the wagon-seat? Lots of good he is as an escort,” laughed Pratt.

“But I don’t really need you,” said the girl, weakly.

“Oh! don’t be so offish!” cried the young man, more seriously. “Don’t you suppose I’d be glad of the chance to ride with you for a way?”

“But your friends – ”

“You’re a friend of mine,” said Pratt, seriously. “I don’t like the look of that Ratty M’Gill. I’m going to Peckham’s with you.”

What could Frances say? Ratty leered at her from his saddle. She knew he must be partly intoxicated, for he was very careless with his matches. He allowed a flaming splinter to fall to the trail, after he lit his cigarette, and, drunk or sober, a cattleman is seldom careless with fire on the plains.

It was mid-pasturage season and the ranges were already dry. A spark might at any time start a serious fire.

“We-ell,” gasped Frances, at last. “I can’t stop you from coming!”

“Of course not!” laughed Pratt, and quickly turned his grey pony to ride beside the pinto.

The wagon was now a long way ahead. They set off on a gallop to overtake it. But when Frances looked over her shoulder after a minute, Ratty M’Gill still remained on the trail, as though undecided whether to follow or not.

CHAPTER XVII

AN ACCIDENT

It was not until later that Frances was disturbed by the thought that Pratt was suspected by her father of having a strong curiosity regarding the Spanish treasure chest.

“And here he has forced his company upon me,” thought the girl. “What would father say, if he knew about it?”

But fortunately Captain Rugley was not at hand with his suspicions. Frances wished to believe the young man from Amarillo truly her friend; and on this ride toward Peckham’s they became better acquainted than before.

That is, the girl of the ranges learned to know Pratt better. The young fellow talked more freely of himself, his mother, his circumstances.

“Just because I’m in a bank–the Merchants’ and Drovers’–in Amarillo doesn’t mean that I’m wealthy,” laughed Pratt Sanderson. “They don’t give me any great salary, and I couldn’t afford this vacation if it wasn’t for the extra work I did through the cattle-shipping season and the kindness of our president.

“Mother and I are all alone; and we haven’t much money,” pursued the young man, frankly. “Mother has a relative somewhere whom she suspects may be rich. He was a gold miner once. But I tell her there’s no use thinking about rich relatives. They never seem to remember their poor kin. And I’m sure one can’t blame them much.

“We have no reason to expect her half-brother to do anything for me. Guess I’ll live and die a poor bank clerk. For, you know, if you haven’t money to invest in bank stock yourself, or influential friends in the bank, one doesn’t get very high in the clerical department of such an institution.”

Frances listened to him with deeper interest than she was willing to show in her countenance. They rode along pleasantly together, and nothing marred the journey for a time.

Ratty had not followed them–as she was quite sure he would have done had not Pratt elected to become her escort. And as for the strange teamster who had turned into the trail ahead of them, his outfit had long since disappeared.

Once when Frances rode to the front of the covered wagon to speak to Mack, she saw that Pratt Sanderson lifted a corner of the canvas at the back and took a swift glance at what was within.

Why this curiosity? There was nothing to be seen in the wagon but the corded chest.

Frances sighed. She could credit Pratt with natural curiosity; but if her father had seen that act he would have been quite convinced that the young man from Amarillo was concerned in the attempt to get the treasure.

It was shortly thereafter that the trail grew rough. Some heavy wagon-train must have gone this way lately. The wheels had cut deep ruts and left holes in places into which the wheels of the Bar-T wagon slumped, rocking and wrenching the vehicle like a light boat caught in a cross-sea.

The wagon being nearly empty, however, Mack drove his mules at a reckless pace. He was desirous of reaching the Peckham ranch in good season for supper, and, to tell the truth, Frances, herself, was growing very anxious to get the day’s ride over.

This haste was a mistake. Down went one forward wheel into a hole and crack went the axle. It was far too tough a stick of oak to break short off; but the crack yawned, finger-wide, and with a serious visage Mack climbed down, after quieting his mules.

The teamster’s remarks were vividly picturesque, to say the least. Frances, too, was troubled by the delay. The sun was now low behind them–disappearing below distant line of low, rolling hills.

Pratt got off his horse immediately and offered to help. And Mack needed his assistance.

“Lucky you was riding along with us, Mister,” grumbled the teamster. “We got to jack up the old contraption, and splice the axle together. I got wire and pliers in the tool box and here’s the wagon-jack.”

He flung the implements out upon the ground. They set to work, Pratt removing his coat and doing his full share.

Meanwhile Frances sat on her pony quietly, occasionally riding around the stalled wagon so as to get a clear view of the plain all about. For a long time not a moving object crossed her line of vision.

“Who you looking for, Frances?” Pratt asked her, once.

“Oh, nobody,” replied the girl.

“Do you expect that fellow is still trailing us?” he went on, curiously.

“No-o. I think not.”

“But he’s on your mind, eh?” suggested Pratt, earnestly. “Just as well I came along with you,” and he laughed.

“So Mack says,” returned Frances, with an answering smile.

Was she expecting an attack? Would Ratty come back? Was the man, Pete, lurking in some hollow or buffalo wallow? She scanned the horizon from time to time and wondered.

The sun sank to sleep in a bed of gold and crimson. Pink and lavender tints flecked the cloud-coverlets he tucked about him.

It was full sunset and still the party was delayed. The mules stamped and rattled their harness. They were impatient to get on to their suppers and the freedom of the corral.

“We’ll sure be too late for supper at Miz’ Peckham’s,” grumbled Mack.

“Oh, you’re only troubled about your eats,” joked Pratt.

At that moment Frances uttered a little cry. Both Pratt and the teamster looked up at her inquiringly.

“What’s the matter, Frances?” asked the young fellow.

“I–I thought I saw a light, away over there where the sun is going down.”

“Plenty of light there, I should say,” laughed Pratt. “The sun has left a field of glory behind him. Come on, now, Mr. Mack! Ready for this other wire?”

“Glory to Jehoshaphat!” grunted the teamster. “The world was made in a shorter time than it takes to bungle this mean, ornery job! I got a holler in me like the Cave of Winds.”

“Hadn’t we better take a bite here?” Frances demanded. “It will be bedtime when we reach the Peckhams.”

“Wal, if you say so, Miss,” said the teamster. “I kin eat as soon as you kin cook the stuff, sure! But I did hone for a mess of Miz’ Peckham’s flapjacks.”

Frances, well used to campwork, became immediately very busy. She ran for greasewood and such other fuel as could be found in the immediate vicinity, and started her fire.

It smoked and she got the strong smell of it in her nostrils, and it made her weep. Pratt, tugging and perspiring under the wagon-body, coughed over the smoke, too.