So, wrapped in their tarpaulins, their heads resting on their saddles, and their feet to the fire, the three boys looked up at the silent stars. They talked in low voices at first, for the voice of man is soothing to cattle. Now and then some cow lowed, or a steer snorted or bellowed. But, in the main, the animals were silent. And to this state Bud and his cousins soon came, for they were tired with their rather long ride late that afternoon.
"I wonder if any rustlers will come here?" spoke d.i.c.k to his brother, when Bud"s regular breathing told that he had fallen asleep.
"Don"t know--wish they would," Nort answered, half drowsily.
"Well, I"m ready for "em," murmured d.i.c.k, as he felt of his gun where it lay in its holster at his side, though he had loosened his belt to lie down.
The night became more silent and colder. The two other cowboys were on the far side of the herd now, working around in opposite circles, meeting and pa.s.sing one another. It would soon be time for them to turn in, and Bud and his cousins to turn out.
Nort was turning over to get into a more comfortable position, when he heard something hiss through the air with a swishing sound. For an instant he thought of rattlesnakes, but almost at once it was borne to his mind that he had heard this sound before--the swish of a lariat through the air.
He sat up quickly, straining his eyes in the direction of the sound.
Just then a piece of the greasewood burned up brightly, and revealed to Nort this sight.
From somewhere in the darkness, beyond the circle of light, a lariat had coiled in among the lads. And as Nort looked, the coils settled over the head of his brother d.i.c.k. Before Nort could cry a warning, or scramble from under his tarpaulin, the rope tightened and d.i.c.k was pulled from his resting place near the fire out into the darkness, his frightened yells awakening the echoes, and startling the cattle into uneasy action.
CHAPTER XIII
THE ATTEMPT FOILED
It was only a moment that surprise held Nort motionless, sitting up there by the small fire of greasewood twigs, with the bunch of cattle moving uneasily in the darkness. Then, with a yell that had in it both warning and encouragement, Nort scrambled to his feet and made a grab for d.i.c.k, who was being dragged off in the loop of a lariat, the other end being manipulated by some one unseen.
"Hold it, d.i.c.k! Hold it!" cried Nort, as, many a time he had thus shouted encouragement to his brother on the football field. "Hold it!"
But d.i.c.k was unable to do this. Taken at a disadvantage, awakened from a half-sleep as he was, and dragged from a fairly comfortable bed, he was puzzled and confused, not to say frightened.
But he was capable of yelling, and this he did to the best of his ability.
"Here! Quit that! Let up! What you doing?" shouted d.i.c.k, for, as he said afterward, he thought it was one of the cowboys playing a trick on him, hazing a tenderfoot, perhaps, though d.i.c.k proudly imagined that he was fast graduating from that cla.s.s.
The yells of the two brothers naturally awakened Bud who, being more used to sleeping in the open than were his cousins, had almost at once gone soundly to sleep. But it did not take the young rancher long to rouse himself.
"What"s the matter? What"s going on?" shouted Bud, and Nort had a glimpse of his cousin with his gun in his hand. This reminded Nort that he had left his weapon under his tarpaulin, and he made a dash to get it, mentally blaming himself for not proving more true to his idea of the traditions of the West, and having his revolver always with him.
With a quick motion of his foot, Bud shoved some unburned sticks of greasewood into the blaze. They flared up, and the young ranchman wheeled quickly, and tried to pierce the gloom into which d.i.c.k had been dragged.
But that lad had not been idle during this strenuous time. He had felt the lariat tightening about the upper part of his body, and he had let out a frightened yell. But he had done more than yell. He had grasped the rope with both hands, in a quick, upward motion, and had succeeded in slipping it off, over his head, a task he would have been unable to perform had his enemy had daylight in his favor. But, as it was, d.i.c.k succeeded in escaping the noose.
"Who is it? Who did that?" yelled d.i.c.k, as he managed to get to his feet, and staggered back toward his tarpaulin, evidently with the intention of seeking his gun.
But there came no answer out of the gloom.
Bud and Nort hurried over to d.i.c.k, who was rather dazed and ruffled up from the experience he had undergone.
"Hurt?" asked Nort, quickly.
"Not to speak of," answered d.i.c.k. "Was that one of the boys?" he asked, turning to Bud.
"One of our cowboys? No, they don"t do such things," was the answer.
"It must have been----"
He was interrupted by the rapid thuds of hoofs and, an instant later, there dashed into the circle of light Dirk and Chot, two of the men who had been left when the others rode away to get on the trail of the rustlers.
"What"s the matter?" exclaimed Dirk, reining in his pony so suddenly that the animal slid with his forefeet almost in the embers of the fire.
"Somebody tried to rope d.i.c.k," answered Bud. "I didn"t see it, but I had a glimpse of him being dragged off on the end of a lariat."
"I saw it come shooting in from out there," and Nort waved his hand toward the darkness.
"I _felt_ it!" grimly declared d.i.c.k. "I just managed to slip it off in time."
"You were lucky," commented Chot. "Let"s see who it was," he added.
"Couldn"t have been any of our lads," he said in a low voice. "I"ve known "em to do such tricks, but not at a time like this. Might have been some fresh puncher from Double Z, but if it was----"
"Come on!" interrupted Dirk, satisfied from a glance that no harm had befallen d.i.c.k. Dirk wheeled his horse and rode off into the darkness, in the direction where the end of the lariat had disappeared, when the unseen thrower had pulled it to him after d.i.c.k"s escape.
The two cowboys, who had been on the far side of the herd, had ridden hurriedly in on hearing the cries of the startled boys. And now they rushed off in the darkness, trying to find out who it was that had displayed such evil intentions.
For it was a desperate thing to do. A little higher up and the rope would have encircled d.i.c.k"s neck, and it would have taken only a short time of pulling him across the ground to have choked him. He, himself, did not realize his danger until later.
For a few moments, after the arrival of Dirk and Chot from the far side of the resting herd, and their subsequent dash off into the darkness, Bud, Nort and d.i.c.k did nothing. They stood there around the greasewood fire, trying to understand clearly what had happened.
Then, from the herd of cattle came unmistakable signs of some disturbance. There were snorts and bellows, the mooing of cows and the stamping of hoofs. At the same time, from the far side, whence Dirk and Chot had ridden in, there came the murmur of voices.
"Rustlers!" cried Bud, understanding at once what it all meant now.
"Dirk! Chot! Come on back! The rustlers are here! It"s a trick!
Come on back!"
"Rustlers!" exclaimed Nort.
"Yes!" shouted Bud. "That"s their game! They tried to scare us so they could work in from the other side, and run off a bunch of steers.
Dirk! Chot!" he cried again, making a megaphone of his hands, and sending his cry out into the night.
"Whoo-oop!" came faintly back to the boys, and then the thud of rapidly moving hoofs mingled with the movement of the cattle. For the steers and cows that were being hazed to the railroad yard were now in motion.
"Put some more wood on!" cried Bud. "If they stampede this way it may hold "em back!"
"Will they stampede?" asked d.i.c.k.
"No telling. Somebody"s in among "em, over on that side, trying to cut out a bunch. We"ve got to held "em in if we can! Get on your ponies!"
It was the work of but a few seconds to do this. The ponies had been staked out not far from the fire, which was now burning brightly from the amount of greasewood piled on it. Bud was first in the saddle, but his cousins were not far behind him.
And, as they mounted, and started to ride around the herd, to hold the now frightened and uneasy animals in check, Dirk and Chot galloped in out of the distant darkness.