Only a youngster, was Bruce West, but manly for all that, who wore his heart on his sleeve, his honesty in his eyes and who would rather frolic than fight but would rather fight than do nothing. When last Kendric had seen him, Bruce was nursing his first mustache and glorying in the triumphant fact that soon he would be old enough to vote; now, barely past twenty-three, he looked a trifle thinner than his former hundred and ninety pounds but never a second older. He was a boy with blue eyes and yellow hair and a profound adoration for all that Jim Kendric stood for in his eager eyes.
"Why all the war paint, Baby Blue-eyes?" Kendric asked as they shook hands. For under Bruce"s knee was strapped a rifle and a big army revolver rode at his saddle horn.
Bruce laughed, his mood having no place for frowns.
"Not just for ornament, old joy-bringer," he retorted. "Using "em every now and then. I"m in deep here, Jim, with every cent I"ve got and every hope of big things. Times, a man has to shoot his way out into the clear or go to the wall. Hey, Gaucho!" he called, turning in his saddle. "You and Tony haze the ponies in to the corrals. And tell Castro we"ve got the King of Spain with us for grub and to put on the best on the ranch; we"ll blow in about noon. Come ahead, Jim; I"ll show you the finest lay-out of a cow outfit you ever trailed your eye across."
They rode, saw everything, both acreage and water and stock, and talked; for the most part Bruce did the talking, speaking with quick enthusiasm of what he had, what he had done, what he meant to accomplish yet in spite of obstacles. He had bought outright some six thousand acres, expending for them and what low-bred stock they fed all of his inherited capital. From the nearest bank, at El Ojo, he had borrowed heavily, mortgaging his outfit. With the proceeds he had leased adjoining lands so that now his stock grazed over ten thousand acres; he had also bought and imported a finer strain of cattle. With the market what it was he was bound to make his fortune, hand over fist----
"If they"d only leave me alone!" he exclaimed hotly.
"They?" queried Kendric.
"Of course the country is unsettled," explained the boy. "Ever since I came into it there has been one sort or another of unrest. When it isn"t outright revolution it"s politics and that"s pretty near the same thing. There are prowling bands of outlaws, calling themselves soldiers, that the authorities can"t reach. Look at those mountains over there! What government that has to give half its time or more to watching its own step, can manage to ferret out every nest of highwaymen in every canon? Those boys are my big trouble, Jim! A raid from them is always on the books and there are times when I"m pretty near ready to throw up the sponge and drift. But it"s a great land; a great land. And now you"re with me!" His eyes shone. "I"ll make you any sort of a proposition you call for, Jim, and together we"ll make history. Not to mention barrels of money."
Kendric"s ever-ready imagination was snared. But he was in no position to forget that he had other fish to fry.
"What do you know of your neighbors?" he asked.
"Not much," admitted Bruce. "And yet enough to _sabe_ what you"re driving at. The nearest are twenty miles away, at the Montezuma ranch.
The boss of the outfit is your old friend Ruiz Rios. I told you that in my letter. I haven"t the dead wood on him but it"s open and shut that he"d as soon chip in on a cattle-stealing deal as anything else."
"He doesn"t own the Montezuma," said Kendric.
"It"s the same thing. The owner is a woman, his cousin, I believe.
But she"s away most of the time, and Rios does as he pleases."
"You don"t know the lady, then?"
"Never saw her. Don"t want to, since she"s got Rios blood in her."
"Let"s get down and roll a smoke and talk," offered Kendric. They were on a gra.s.sy knoll; there were oaks and shade and gra.s.s for the horses.
Bruce looked at him sharply, catching the sober note. But he said nothing until they were lying stretched out under the oaks, holding the tie ropes at the ends of which their horses browsed.
"Cut her loose, Jim," he said then. "What"s the story?"
Kendric told him: Of his quest with Twisty Barlow; of Zoraida Castlemar and her ambitions; of his own situation in the household, a prisoner with today granted him only in exchange for his word to return by dawn; and finally of Betty Gordon.
"Good G.o.d," gasped Bruce. "They"re going it that strong? Out in the open, too! And laying their paws on an American girl. Whew!"
Kendric added briefly an account of his being stopped in the pa.s.s.
"It"s a fair bet," he concluded, "that your raiders get their word straight from the Montezuma ranch. Which means, straight from the lips of Zoraida Castlemar."
Bruce fell to plucking at the dry gra.s.s, frowning.
"Funny thing, it strikes me, Jim, that if you"re right she should give you the chance to tip me off. How do you figure that out?"
"I haven"t figured it out. Here"s what we do know: When I was a dozen miles from her place and naturally would suppose that, if I chose, I was free to play out my own hand, up popped those three men; a reminder, as plain as your hat, that through their eyes I was still under the eyes of Zoraida Castlemar. Further, as innocent as a fool, I carried a message to them in a cut and tied saddle string. A message that was a pa.s.sport for me; what other significance it carried, _quien sabe_? There"s a red ta.s.sel on my horse"s bridle; that might be another sign, as far as you and I know. The quirt at my saddle horn, the chains in my bridle, the saddle itself or the folds of the saddle blanket--how do we know they don"t all carry her word? An easy matter, if only the signal is prearranged."
"The fine craft of the Latin mind," muttered Bruce.
"Rather the subtlety of the old Aztecs," suggested Kendric.
"But all this could have been done as well, and taking no chances, by one of the Montezuma riders."
"Of course. Hence, the one thing clear is that it was desired that I should see you. Since it was obvious that I"d tell you what I knew, that"s the odd part of it."
"Why, it"s madness, man! It gives us the chance, if no other, to get word back home about the little Gordon girl."
"I"d thought of that. Just how would we do it? A letter in the nearest postoffice?"
"You mean that the postmaster would be on the watch for it? And would play into her hands? Well, suppose we took the trouble to send a cowboy to some other, further postoffice? Or, by golly, to send him all the way to the border? Or, if I should go with the word myself?"
"Answer: If you sent an Indian, how much would you bet that he did not circle back to the Montezuma ranch with the letter? If you went yourself, how far do you suppose you"d ever get?"
Bruce"s eyes widened.
"Do you suppose they"re going that strong, Jim?"
"I don"t know, Bruce. But tell me: if it seemed the wise thing to do, could you drop everything here and make a try to get through with the word?"
Bruce looked worried.
"It"s my hunch," he answered, "that it would be a cheaper play for me to pay the twenty-five thousand dollar ransom and be done with it! You don"t know how bad things are here, Jim; if I went and came back it would be to find that I"d been cleaned. No, I"m not exaggerating. And with the mortgage on the place, the next thing I would know was that it was foreclosed and in the end I"d lose everything I"ve got."
"From which I gather you don"t put a whole lot of confidence in your cowboys?"
"That"s the plain h.e.l.l of it! Not only have I got to sleep with one eye on my stock; I"ve got to keep the other peeled on the men that are taking my pay. I never know what other man"s pay they"re taking at the same time."
"Or what woman"s. Well, I imagine Miss Castlemar knows conditions as well as we do, if not a good deal better. So it looks as though she were taking no chances in letting me ride over to see you; and it remains possible that by so doing I am furthering her purpose. Though just how, is another thing I don"t know."
"She must be some corker of a female," muttered Bruce. "What does she look like, Jim?"
"Tall. Young and not bad looking. Vain as a peac.o.c.k and high and mighty."
"That kind of a girl makes me sick," was young Bruce"s quick decision.
"Let"s ride back, Jim; it"ll be time to eat."
As they rode slowly down toward the ranch house Bruce pointed out how, living in constant expectation of the operations of cattle and horse thieves, he took what precautions he could. The pick of his saddle horses, a dozen of them, were grazed during the day in the fields near the house and at night were brought in and stabled. A number of the finest cattle, including a thoroughbred Hereford bull and forty beautiful Hereford cows, recently purchased, were driven each evening into the nearest fields where from dark to daylight they were herded by a night rider.
"I"ve got to take it for granted," explained West, "that at least some of my vacqueros are on the level. I pick my best men for jobs like this. And I"ve always got night riders out, making their rounds from one end of the valley to the other. On top of all that I"ve got my dogs; look, here they come to meet us."
There were ten of them, big tan and white collies, vying with one another to come first to their master. Splendid animals all of them, but at the fore ran the most splendid of them all, the father and patriarch of his flock. It was his keen nostril and eye that was wont first to know who came; his superb strength and speed carried him well in the lead and he guarded his supremacy jealously. His sharp teeth snapped viciously when a hardy son ran close at his side and the youngster, though he snarled and bristled, swerved widely and thus fell back. They barked as they swept on, the sharp, stacatto bark of their breed.
"They"re something I can trust," said Bruce proudly. "No hand but mine feeds them; if I catch a man carressing one of them he draws his pay and quits. And I go to sleep of nights reasonably sure that their din will wake me if an outsider sets foot near the home corrals. Hi!
Monarch! Jump for it."
From his pocket he brought out a bit of dried beef, the "jerky" of the southwest. He held it out arm"s length, sending his horse racing forward with a sudden touch of his spur. The big dog barked eagerly and launched his sinewy body into the air; the sunlight flashed back a moment from the bared sharp teeth; Monarch dropped softly back to earth with the dried beef already bolted. Bruce laughed.