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Show The Land of Broken Promises A Stirring Story of the Mexican Revolution By DANE COOLIDGE Aushtr if "The Fiihtlne Fool." "Hidden Waters." "The Texican." Etc. (Copyright, 1914, by Frank A. Munsey.) SYNOPSIS. ' Bud Hooker and Phil De Lancey are forced, owing to a revolution in Mexico, to give up their mining claim and return to the United States. In the border town of Gadsden Bud meets Henry Kruger, a wealthy miner, who makes him a proposition propo-sition to return to Mexico to acquire title to a very rich mine which Kruger had blown up when he found he had been cheated out of the title by one Aragon. The Mexican subsequently spent a large Sum in an unsuccessful attempt to relocate relo-cate the vein and then allowed the land to revert for taxes. Hooker and De Lancey Lan-cey arrive at Fortuna near where the mine, known as the Eagle Tail, is located. lo-cated. They engage the services of Cruz Mendez, who has been friendly to Kruger, to Horiuire the title for them, and get a permit to do preliminary work. Aragon protests and accuses them of jumping his claim. Bud discovers that matrimonial entanglements prevent Mendez from perfecting per-fecting a valid title. Phil, who has been paying attention to Aragon's daughter, Gracia, decides to turn Mexican and get the title in his own name. Bud objects to Phil's attentions to Gracia. Aragon fails in his attempt to drive them off the claim. Rebels are reported in the vicinity. vicin-ity. Stories of rapine and bloodshed are brought in. Bud and Phil begin work in earnest on their claim. CHAPTER XIII Continued. It was slow work; slower than they had thought,, and the gang of Mexicans Mexi-cans that they had hired for muckers were marvels of ineptitude. Left to themselves, they accomplished nothing, noth-ing, since each problem they encountered encoun-tered seemed to present to them some element of insuperable difficulty, to solve which they either went into caucus cau-cus or waited for the bos6. To the Mexicans of Sonora Bernardo Bravo was the personification of all the malevolent qualities he being a bandit chief who had turned first general gen-eral and then rebel under Madero and the fact that he had at last been driven out of Chihuahua and therefore over into Sonora, made his malevolence malevo-lence all the more imminent. Undoubtedly, somewhere over to the east, where the Sierras towered like a blue wall, Bernardo and his outlaw followers were gathering for a raid, and the raid would bring death to So nora. He was a bad man, this Bernardo Bravo, and if half of the current stories sto-ries were true, he killed men whenever when-ever they failed to give him money, and was never too hurried to take a fair daughter of the country up behind him, provided -she took his fancy. Yes, surely he was a bad man but that did not clear away the rock. For the first week Phil took charge of the gang, urging, directing and cajoling ca-joling them, and the work went merrily mer-rily on, though rather slowly. The Mexicans liked to work for Don Felipe, he was so polite ;and spoke such good Spanish; but at the end of the week It developed that Bud could get more results out of them. Every time Phil started to explain anything to one Mexican all the others oth-ers stopped to listen to him, and that took time. But Bud's favorite way of directing a man was by grunts and signs and bending his own back to the task. Also, he refused to understand under-stand Spanish, and cut off all long-winded long-winded explanations and suggestions . y an impatient motion to go to work, which the trabajadores obeyed with shrugs and grins. So Don Felipe turned powder-man find blacksmith, sharpening up the drills at the little forge they had fashioned fash-ioned and loading the holes with dynamite dy-namite when it became necessary to break a rock, while Bud bossed the Dnwilling Mexicans. In an old tunnel behind their tent they Set a heavy gate, and behind it they Stored their precious powder. Thell came the portable forge and the blacksmith shop, just inside the mouth of the cave, and the tent backed up ugainst it for protection. For if there is any one thing, next to horses, that the rebels are wont to steal, it is giant powder to blow up culverts with, or to lay on the counters of timorous country merchants and frighten them Into making contributions. As for their horsee, Bud kept them belled and hobbled, close to the house, and no one ever saw him without his gun. In the morning, when he got up, lie took it from under his pillow and hung it on his belt, and there it rtayed until bedtime. He also kept a sharp watch on the trail, above and below, and what few men did pass through were conscious of his eye. Therefore it was all the more surprising when, one day, looking look-ing up suddenly from heaving at a great rock, he saw the big Yaqui soldier, sol-dier, Amigo, gazing down at him from the cut bank. Yes, it wras the same man, but with a difference his rifle and cartridge-belts cartridge-belts were absent and his clothes were torn by the brush. But the same good-natured, competent smile was there, and after a few words with Bud he leaped nimbly down the bank and laid hold upon the rock. They pulled together, and the boulder that had balked Bud's gang of Mexicans moved 'easily for the two of them. Then Amigo seized a crowbar and slipped it into a cranny and showed them a few things about moving rocks. For half an hour or more he worked along, seemingly bent on displaying his skill, then he sat down on the bank and watched the Mexicans with tolerant, half-amused eyes. If he was hungry he showed it only by the cigarettes he smoked, and Hooker, studying up the chances he would take by hiring a deserter, let him wait until he came to a decision. "Oyez, Amigo," he hailed at last, and, rubbing his hand around on his stomach, he 6miled questioningly, whereat the Yaqui nodded his head avidly. "Stawano!" said Hooker, "ven." And he left his Mexicans to dawdle as they would while he led the Indian to camp. There he showed him the coffee-pot and the kettle of beans by the fire, set out a slab of Dutch-oven bread and a sack of jerked beef, some stewed fruit and a can of sirup, and left him to do his worst. In the course of half an hour or so he came back and found the Yaqui sopping up sirup with the last of the bread and humming a little tune. So they sat down and smoked a cigarette and came to the business at hand. "Where you go?" inquired Bud; but Amigo only shrugged enigmatically. "You like to work?" continued Bud, and the Indian broke into a smile of assent. "Muy bien," said Hooker with final-' ity; "I give Mexicans two dollars a day I give you four. Is that enough?" "Si," nodded the Yaqui, and without more words he followed Bud back to the cut. There, in half a day, he accomplished ac-complished more than all the Mexicans Mexi-cans put together, leaping boldly up the bank to dislodge hanging boulders, boosting them by main strength up onto the ramshackle tram they had constructed, and trundling them out to the dump with the shove of a mighty hand. He was a willing worker, using his head every minute; but though he was such a hustler and made their puny efforts seem so ineffectual by comparison, compari-son, iie managed in some mysterious way to gain the immediate approval of the Mexicans. Perhaps it was his all-pervasive good nature, or the respect re-spect inspired by his hardihood; per haps the qualities of natural leadership leader-ship which had made, him a picked man among his brother Yaquis. But when, late in the afternoon, Bud came back from a trip to the tent he found Amigo in charge of the gang, heaving and struggling and making motions with his head. "Good enough!" he muttered, after watching him for a minute in silence, and leaving the new boss in command, he went back and started supper. That was the beginning of a new day at the Eagle Tail, and .when De Lancey came back from town whither whith-er he went whenever he could conjure up an errand he found that, for once, he had not been missed. Bud was doing the blacksmithing, Amigo was directing the gang, and a fresh mess of beans was on the fire, the first kettleful having gone to reinforce rein-force the Yaqui's backbone. But they were beans well spent, and Bud did not regret the raid on his grub-pile. If he could get half as much work for what he fed the Mexicans he could well rest content. "But how did this Indian happen to find you?" demanded Phil, when his pardner had explained his acquisition. "Say, he must have deserted from his company when they brought tiiem back from Moctezuma!" "More'n likely," assented Bud. "lie ain't talking much, but I notice he keeps his eye out they'd shoot him for a deserter if they could ketch him. I'd hate to see him go that way." "Well, if he's as good as this, let's take care of him!" cried Phil with enthusiasm. "I'll, tell you, Bud, there's something big coming off pretty soon and I'd like to stay around town a little more if I could. I want to keep track of things." "F'r instance?" suggested Hooker dryly. It had struck him that Phil was spending a good deal of time in town already. "Well, there's this revolution. Sure as shooting they're going to pull one soon. There's two thousand Mexican miners working at Fortuna, and they say every one of 'em has got a rifle buried. Now they're beginning to quit and drift out into the hills, and we're likely to hear from them any tlma" "All the more reason for staying in camp, then," remarked Bud. "I'll tell you, Phil, I need you here. That dogged ledge is lost, good and plenty, and I need you to say where to dig. We ain't doing much better than old Aragon did just rooting around in that rock-pile let's do a little timbering, timber-ing, and sink." "You can't timber that rock," answered an-swered De Lancey decidedly. "And besides, it's cheaper to make a cut twenty feet deep than it is to tunnel or sink a shaft. Wait till we get to that porphyry contact then we'll know where we're at." "All right," grumbled Bud; "but seems like we're a long time getting there. What's the news downtown?" "Well, the fireworks have begun again over in Chihuahua Orozco and Salazar and that bunch but it seems there was something to this Moctezuma Mocte-zuma scare, after all. I was talking to an American mining man from down that way and he told me that the federals fed-erals marched out to where the rebels were and then sat down and watched them cross the river without firing on them some kind of an understanding between Bernardo Bravo and these blackleg federals. "The only fighting there was was when a bunch of twenty Yaquis got away from their officers in the rough country and went after Bernardo Bravo Bra-vo by their lonesome. That threw a big scare into him, too, but he managed man-aged to fight them off and if I was making a guess I'd bet that your Yaqui friend was one of that fighting twenty." "I reckon," assented Bud; "but don't you say nothing. I need that hombre in my business. Come on, let's go up and look at that cut I come across an old board today, down in the muck, and I bet you it's a piece that Kruger left. Funny we don't come across some of his tools, though, or the hole where the powder went off." "When we do that," observed Phil, "we'll be where we're going. Nothing to do then but lay off the men and wait till I get my papers. That's why I say don't hurry 60 hard we haven't got our title to this claim, pardner, and we won't get it, either not for some time yet. Suppose you'd hit this ledge " "Well, If I hit it," remarked Bud, "I'll stay with it you can trust me for that. Hello, what's the Yaqui found?" As they came up the cut Amigo quit work and, while the Mexicans followed suit and gathered expectantly behind him, he picked up three rusty drills and an iron drill-spoon and presented them to Bud. Evidently he had learned the object of their search from the Mexicans, but if he looked for any demonstrations of delight at sight of these much-sought-for tools he was doomed to disappointment, disappoint-ment, for both Bud. and Phil had schooled themselves to keep their faces straight. "Um-m," said Bud, "old drills, eh? Where you find them?" The Yanui led the way to the face of the cut and showed the spot, a hole beneath the pile of riven rock; and a Mexican, not to be outdone, grabbed up a handful of porphyry and indicated indi-cated where the dynamite had pulverized pulver-ized it. "Bien," said Phil, pawing solemnly around in the bottom of the hole; and then, filling his handkerchief with fine dirt, he carried it down to the creek. There, in a miner's pan, he washed it out carefully, slopping the waste over the edge and swirling the water around until at last only a little dirt was left in the bottom of the pan. Then, while all the Mexicans looked on, he tailed this toward the edge, scanning the last remnant for gold and quit without a color. "Nada!" he cried, throwing down the pan, and in some way the Mexicans Mexi-cans sensed the fact that the mine had turned out a failure. Three times he went back to the cut and scooped up the barren dust, andHhen he told the men they could quit. "No more work!" he said, affecting a dejected bitterness; "no hay nada there is nothing!" And with this sad, but by no means unusual, ending to their labors, the Mexicans went away to their camp, speculating among themselves as to whether they could get their pay. But when the last of them had gone Phil beckoned Bud into the tent and showed him a piece of quartz. "Just take a look at that!" he said, and a single glance told Hooker that it was full of fine particles of gold. "I picked (hat up when they weren't looking," whispered De Lancey, his eyes dancing with triumph. "It's the same rock the same as Kruger's!" "Well, put 'er there, then, pardner!" cried Bud, grabbing at De Lancey's hand; "we've struck It!" And with a broad grin on their deceitful de-ceitful faces they danced silently around the tent, after which they paid off the Mexicans and bade them "adios!" CHAPTER XIV. It is a great sensation Btriking It rich one of the greatest in the world. Some men punch a burro over the desert all their lives in the hope of achieving it once; Bud and Phil had taken a chance, and the prize now lay within their grasp. Only a little while now a month, maybe, if the officials were slow and the title would be theirs. The Mexican miners, blinded by their ignorance, went their way, well contented to get their money. Nobody knew. There was nothing to do but to wait. But to wait, as some people know, is the hardest work in the world. For the first few days they lingered about the mine, gloating over it in secret, laughing back and forth, singing sing-ing gay songs then, as the ecstasy passed and the weariness of waiting set - in, they went two ways. Some fascination, unexplained to Bud, drew De Lancey to the town. He left In the morning and came back at night, but Hooker stayed at the mine. Day and night, week-days and Sundays, Sun-days, he watched It jealously, lest someone should slip in and surprise their secret and for company he had his pet horse. Copper Bottom, and the Yaqui Indian, Amigo. Ignacio was the Indian's real name, for the Yaquis are all good Catholics and named uniformly after the saints; but Bud had started to call him Amigo, or friend, and Ignacio had conferred the same name on him. Poor Ignacio! His four-dollar-a-day Job had gone glimmering in half a day, but when the Mexican laborers departed he lingered around the camp, doing odd jobs, until he won a place for himself. At night he slept up in the rocks, where no "treachery could take him unarare, but at the first peep of dawn it was always Amigo who arose and lit the fire. Then, if no one got up, he cooked a breakfast after his own ideas, boiling the coffee until it was as strong as lye, broiling meat on sticks, and went to turn out the horses. With the memory of many envious glances cast at Copper Bottom, Hooker had built a stout corral, where he kept the horses up at night, allowing them to graze close-hobbled in the daytime. A Mexican insurrecto on foot is a contradiction of terms, if there are any horses or mules in the country, and several bands of ex-miners from Fortuna had gone through their camp in that condition, with new riflee in their hands. But if they had any designs de-signs on the Eagle Tail live stock they speedily gave them up; for, while he would feed them and even listen to their false tales of patriotism, Bud had no respect for numbers when it came to admiring his horse. Even with the Yaqui, much as he trusted him, he had reservations about Copper Bottom; and once, when he found him petting him and stroking his nose, he shook his head forbiddingly. forbid-dingly. And from that day on, though he watered Copper Bottom and cared for his wants, Amigo was careful never to caress him. But in all other matters, even to lending him his gun, Bud trusted the Yaqui absolutely. It was about a week after he came to camp that Amigo sighted a deer, and when Bud loaned him his rifle he killed it with a single shot. Soon afterward he came loping back from a scouting trip and made signs for the gun again, and this time he brought in a young peccary, which he roasted in a pit, Indian style. After that, when the meat was low, Bud sent him out to hunt, and each time he brought back a wild hog or a deer for every cartridge. The one cross under which the Yaqui suffered was the apparent failure fail-ure of the mine, and, after slipping up into the cut a few times, he finally came back radiant. , "Mira!" he said, holding out a piece of rock; and when Hooker gazed at the chunk of quartz he pointed to the specks of gold and grunted, "Oro!" "Seguro!" answered Bud, and going down into his pocket, he produced another an-other like it. At this the Yaqui cocked his head to one side and regarded him strangely. "Why you no dig gold?" he asked at last, and then Bud told him the story. "We have an enemy," he said, "who might steal it from us. So now we wait for papers. When we get them, we dig!" "Ah!" breathed Amigo, his face suddenly sud-denly clearing up; "and can I work for you then?" "SI," answered Bud, "for four dollars dol-lars a day. But now you help me watch, so nobody comes." "Stawano!" exclaimed the Indian, well satisfied, and after that he spent hours on the hilltop, his black head thrust out over the crest like a chuck-awalla chuck-awalla lizard as he conned the land below. So the days went by until three weeks had passed, and still no papers came. As his anxiety increased Phil fell into the habit of staying in town overnight, and finally he was gone for two days. The third day was drawing to a close, and Bud was getting restless, rest-less, when suddenly he beheld the Yaqui bounding down the hill in great leaps and making slgus down the canyon. "Two men!" he called, dashing u; the tent; "one of them & rural!" r "Why a rural?" asked Bud, rn; J fled. "To take me!" cried Amigo, strit; himself violently on the breast. 'T, me your rifle!" I( "No," answered Bud, after a pat ' "you might get into trouble. Run i-s hide in the rocks I will signal ; when to come back." ' "Muy bien," said the Yaqui ot ently, and, turning, he went up t rocks like a mountain-sheep, bount from boulder to boulder until he appeared among the hilltopa. T as Bud brought in his horse and s him hastily inside his corral, the ' riders came around the point a r s and Aragon! o Now, In Mexico a rural, as Bud u knew, means trouble and An ic meant more trouble, trouble for ;t" Certainly, so busy a man as Don C ' ano would not come clear to hig c 5t to help capture a Yaqui deserter, .if sensed it from the start that this h another attempt to get possesslo: c their mine, and he awaited their in lng grimly. ae " 'S tardes," he said in reply tc be rural's abrupt salute, and thee I stood silent before his tent, loc 01 them over shrewdly. The rural iv a hard-looking citizen, as mac; le them are, but on this occasior , seemed a trifle embarrassed, glar ic. inquiringly at Aragon. As for An f , he was gazing at a long line of jt :h meat which Amigo had hung o 'h dry, and his drooped eye open': a; suddenly as he turned his cold r- :.a upon Hooker. ol: "Senor," he said, speaking wit ju accusing harshness, "we are lo w for the men who are stealing mi cattle, and I see we have not f, o go. Where did you get that mea , "I got it from a deer," ret. ,;i Bud; "there is his hide on the ir-you ir-you can see it if you'll look." j The rural, glad to create a i iat sion, rode over and examined the hi; and came back satisfied, but A: 0r was not so easily appeased. ie "By what right," he demanded ;hi ulently, "do you, an American )nt deer in our country? Have yo -0 special permit which is required "No, senor," answered Hook; t;s berly; "the deer was killed by a jj ican I have working for me!" "Ha!" sneered Aragon, and th ug paused, balked. .ej "Where is this Mexican?" in', the rural, his professional ins j aroused, and while Bud was expl. la that he was out in the hills t e where, Aragon spurred his hor: j closer and peered curiously hr . tent. 3ul "What are you looking for" e mantled Hooker sharply, and the: g gon showed his hand. ryj "I am looking for the drills ani T spoon," he said; "the ones you a when vou took my mine!" ce "Then get back out of there!'' ' WS Bud, seizing his horse by the t. throwing him back on his hau: "and 6tay out!" he added, i dropped his hand to his gun. "'. ea the rural wishes to search," t( go turning to that astounded offici. j is welcome to do so." "Muchas gracias, no!" return; rural, shaking a finger in front - qsj face, and then he strode over to ."" , is I Aragon was muttering and spot low tone. "No!" dissented Aragon, shak;: head violently; "no- no! I war. man arrested!" he cried, turnir-. , dictively upon Bud. "He has ; ' i . . . i e n my tools my mine mv land! 1 , . , ma no business here no title! Th;-. is mine, cyid I tell him to go. Pn js he shouted, menacing Hooker w; j riding-whip, but Bud only shift- jj feet and stopped listening to 1 cited Spanish. "No, senor," he said, when it v n over, "this claim belongs to my -tl jc ner, De Lancey. You have no ' 1Q "Ha! De Lancey!" jeered A .e suddenly indulging himself in not donic laugh. "De Lancey! Ha , a "What's the matter?" cried H gQ as the rural joined in with a d do smjrk. "Say, spea.k up, hombrt threatened, stepping closer as hi: took on a dangerous gleam. "A .FA me tell you now," he added, "i any man touches a hair of his t;en I'll kill him like a dog!" sen The rural backed his horse a if suddenly discovering that tile ican was dangerous, and then, ,yne ing respectfully as he took his jen( he said: Iop "The Senor De Lancey Is In 10eir They whirled their horses n'; p and galloped off down the canyo' i nc as Bud gazed after them he bun e u a frenzy of curses. Then, wi: );e ; one thought of setting Phil fr d n ran out to the corral and hurlain, saddle on his horse. ,ed, (TO 111J CONTINUED.) hsta |