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Show INSTALLMENT EIGHTEEN THE STORY SO FAR: Ellen Carey seems interested In two men, Jeff Brand, rusUer, and Calhoun Terry, ranch manager. man-ager. Four rustlers had been mysteriously mysteri-ously killed. The big ranchers, though much over Terry's protest, hired an CHAPTER XXXVI The raiders under Ellison reached Packer's Fork safely and tound the wagons waiting for them. After a hot meal they bedded down for the night. , Guards were set round the encampment, to be relieved every few hours. Morning found them unmolested. A No, By Joe rider came across the hills with the news that a large body of men was following them about three miles in the rear. A few minutes later one of Sunday Brown's men who had been scouting scout-ing in advance of the others came back at a gallop to report that he had been fired on by men hiding behind large piles of baled hay on a hilltop which commanded the road. After a short consultation McFaddin took a dozen men with him to feel out the strength of the party. They exchanged shots for a few minutes without damage to either party, after which McFaddin brought his men back to the main krmy. There were, he guessed, forty for-ty or fifty men behind the rampart of bales. The leaders quickly decided decid-ed to leave the road and took to the foothills in a detour to a ranch known as the Wagonwheel Gap. Collins swung from his horse and stepped to the porch. ' Bluntly he stated the situation. "Hell has broke loose in Georgia, boys. The whole damn country is headed this way for the war. That means we're in for a fight. We don't want to be caught in the open, and this- spot is made to order for us. McFaddin and Ellison Elli-son agree with me. What do you think, Sunday?" . The big Texan marshal nodded his head. "I would say we are in luck to find such a place. We have all army of Texas ex-peace officers to Invade In-vade the countryside and kill without trial ail suspected rustlers. By mistake, Terry and his foreman, Larry, are attacked at-tacked by the invaders. Jeff, thinking them rusUers, comes to help them. Is can pick up a horse somewhere," McFaddin said. "Take care of yourself, your-self, boy. Until you are through their lines you'll have to lie low when the moon comes out from behind the clouds." Yancey followed the stream, moving mov-ing through the water carefully in order not to make a misstep on a slippery rock that would cause him to stumble and make a splash. The creek was lined with willows after he had passed out of the cotton-wood cotton-wood grove in which the ranch buildings build-ings were situated. The Texan left the creek and crept toward the log fence which separated him from the enemy. He waited until a dark cloud swept In front of the moon, then clambered clam-bered over the fence and moved forward for-ward through the brush. A voice hailed him. "Hello, fellow! fel-low! Where you been?" ' The messenger knew he had been mistaken by one of the other party for a friend. "I slipped down to that log fence to have a look at it," Yancey answered. an-swered. "Nothing doing there. The logs are too close to crawl through." "Hmp! I could of told you that. Got the makings?" The Texan handed the man a sack of tobacco and his little book of paper wrappings. He had to Wait while the homesteader shook out the tobacco and rolled the cigarette. The hillman had not taken a second look at the donor, but Yancey felt very nervous. He heard somebody else moving toward them through the brush. "Say, I gotta be beatin' it,"he mentioned. "I'm supposed to be with the remuda:" "Hell! This ain't no regular army. We don't have to take orders." The advancing man loomed out of the darkness. Yancey recognized him. He had known Lee Hart when he had worked on the Two Star Ranch three or four years earlier. Hart spent a good deal of time loaf- wounded. A rescue party takes Jeff to town for medical treatment, and Terry and Larry are arrested by sheriff for safekeeping. Jeff explains to the mob. Cal, free, doesn't know Ellen loves him, not Jeff. but just as uncompromising. "They can hang out a white flag if they want to surrender," he said. "Until then we haven't any terms to offer." "What terms will you give if they do decide to surrender?" Carey asked. ' Herriott's bleak gaze rested on the face of the Box 55 owner. "I wouldn't know. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. The fellows who hired Turley to kill our friends will have to pay the price. So will those who murdered Dave Morgan and Sib Lee. There won't be any compromise about that." Argument was of no use. The bitterness bit-terness of the feeling was too great. When they went to get their horses they were met by the announcement that they were to stay here for the present. They had not been asked to come, but since they had done so they were not to leave. "Who says so?", asked Terry. "Doesn't matter about that. You stick around." Terry strolled down toward the firing-line, from which occasional flashes came. He was not apparently apparent-ly under surveillance, but the horses were being watched. A draw brought him to an aspen grove. Calhoun hesitated, uncertain whether to go round it or go back to the summit of the hill from which he had just come. He passed into the aspens. Guns sounded, close to him. What surprised him was that they were revolver shots. The distance was too great to reach the ranch house except with rifles. He heard excited voices, and presently the sound of a runner coming into the aspens. The escaping man collapsed and sank to the ground. Almost in a murmur, Terry said, "What seems to be the trouble?" The man on the ground turned a startled face toward him and reached for a gun. , "Not necessary," the Diamond Reverse Re-verse B man said. "I won't hurt you or call anybody." Yancey recognized him. What are you doing here with these fellows, Mr. Terry?" he asked, surprised "I came to try to fix up a truce, but the settlers wouldn't have it." Calhoun asked a question. "Was it you they were shooting at?" v"They hit me in the leg. I'm one of Sunday Brown's Texans. They sent me from the ranch to get a telegram through to Washington asking for troops." "Hit bad?" "Not so bad. I can't travel, that's sure. Not on that game leg." "You have a written message?" "Yes." He added, worried, "They're depending on me at the ranch." "I might get it through for you. But I can't leave you here." Terry gave instructions. "Stay here. I'll have a try for the horse. When you hear me coming move to the edge of the aspens." Terry walked up the incline toward to-ward the draw and met Lane Carey. "I heard some revolver shots," Lane said. "Hope they weren't firing fir-ing at you." x . "No. At a fellow named Yancey who was trying to get through a telegram from the beleaguered men to send to the Governor. They hit him, but he got away and is hiding in the aspens. I'm trying to get a horse for him that one in the draw there." "How badly is he hurt? Can he ride?" "He says so. If I could get two horses I'd try to go with him." "You'd be shot down before you got twenty yards." "I'm not so sure. It's dark when the moon is under a cloud. More men keep riding in to join the attackers. at-tackers. Nobody is paying any attention at-tention to us." v "Not as long as we don't try to get away. But they have sentries sen-tries out. I ran into one and he warned me back." , They were moving in the direction direc-tion of the saddled horse. It was a rather heavily built sorrel gelding "I'm going to try it," Terry said.' "They will find Yancey soon if 1 don't get him away, and if they do he's a goner." He untied the horse, and the two men walked baclt with it toward the aspens. They met a man whom they recognized as the owner of a wagon yard at Round Top. He said. the food we need and the creek runs right past the house. It would take an army to dig us out." The rubicund little ranchman wasted wast-ed no more time in talk. "Then get busy, boys. We'll occupy the ranch house, the stable, and the bunkhouse. Get out your picks and shovels from the wagon. We'll run a triangle of trenches connecting the buildings so that we can't get cut off from each other." A sleepy-eyed little man came out from the house. -"Say, what's going go-ing on here?" he wanted to know. He was the ranch cook. The boss and his family had gone to Larkspur for the day and left him to take care of the place. Collins 'grinned at him. "You haven't lost your job, Doc. Here are sixty or seventy hungry men. You can flunky for our cook. You'll like that." The Wagonwheel Gap cook did not like it, but there was nothing to do about it. He was in the army by draft and accepted his position philosophically. Inside of ten minutes min-utes he was busy making a great batch of bread. The ranch was" excellently situated situat-ed for defense. On all sides of it were low, rolling hills with little large brush except in a few gullies. Plenty of water for the horses could be got from Bear Creek, which ran close to both the stable and the house. - An adjoining corral had a large haystack near the barn, in case the supply in the loft gave out. The arrival of a large body of settlers set-tlers interrupted these preparations. Bill Herriott was in command. He stationed -his men along a ridge to the north jai the house, and they began be-gan to pour down a scattering fire that drove the ditch-diggers and the timber workers to cover. As word spread that the cattle barons and their Texans had been trapped, reinforcements re-inforcements poured in to join the attackers. Clouds scudded across the sky and obscured the moon so that nightfall brought darkness. The ditch-diggers went to work again, protected by ramparts of logs built between them and their enemies along the bluff. The firing did not die down entirely, but it became intermittent and sporadic. spo-radic. The leaders of the party held a conference in the living-room of the ranch house. They did not deceive themselves about the ultimate outcome out-come of the battle. In time the settlers set-tlers would overpower them by sheer numbers, unless help came to them from outside. That help could come only from government troops. Pnllinc lit. a rifnr as he Innnppri Yancey followed the stream. ing at Round Top and everybody in the county knew the man. "Just had word there's a big bunch of boys coming down from Larkspur to join .us," he said. His gaze rested on the Texan. It was a moment before be-fore his memory placed the young fellow. "Why, it's Hal Yancey! What you doing here? Thought you went back to Texas." "I did. Got into Larkspur only three days ago. I'm on the bread line. How's everything, Lee?" "Fine. We've got. these sons-of-guns where we want them at last." Hart pulled his talk up abruptly. He stared at Yancey blankly. A sudden sud-den suspicion had disturbed him. "Say, We'll go talk with Bill Herriott. Her-riott. A lot of Texans have come in mighty recently. Maybe " The barrel of Yancey's revolver pointed at Hart. "Let's not talk with anyone, Lee. Let's all three move deeper into the brush. I'm on an errand, and I don't want to talk with Bill. Drift along to the right, boys. I'm not allowing to harm either ei-ther of you if you behave." They drifted, but unfortunately di- in an easy chair. He laughed sardonically. sar-donically. "We fixed it all up so nice to have the soldiers looking another way when we pulled off our raid that I don't reckon it will be easy to attract their attention now. Like as not the Great White Father ican't hear us when we holler." Ellison paced the floor anxiously. He more than anybody else had got them into this trap, and he was worried wor-ried about the outcome. To the others oth-ers he read a telegram he had written. writ-ten. It was directed to the Governor, Gover-nor, and it asked him to urge the President to order troops from Fort Garfield to the Wagonwheel Gap Ranch at once. A volunteer called for to get it to Cheyenne. It was decided that the safest place from which to send the wire was Jim Creek. The station agent there was friendly to the big cattle interests and would not hold up the message. A dozen men volunteered to try to run the enemy lines and get the telegram through. A young Texan named Hal Yancey was chosen. He was not married, and he had once worked on the Two Star Ranch and knew the country fairly well. Moreover, More-over, he was a seasoned man, game and determined. "I'll get the message through if I can," he promised. "You'll have to hoof it unless you rectly toward another group of three or four men. Yancey bolted into the brush as Hart yelled out a warning. Bullets whistled in the darkness. The Texan knew he had been hit. but kept going. He dodged into a draw and ran limping down it. When he reached a clump of aspens he buried himself in them and sank to the ground. He believed he had evaded the pursuit. A low voice, not six feet from him, asked, "What seems to be the trouble?" CHAPTER XXXVII When Terry and Carey offered their services as mediators to the little group who seemed to be leading lead-ing the attackers the proposal was rejected at once. The Diamond Reverse Re-verse B superintendent was noV in favor with the people's party, even though he had escaped lynching by a narrow squeak. Lane Carey had always been liked by the settlers, but he too had signed the telegram asking for the soldiers and was temporarily tem-porarily uncer suspicion. "We don't aim to do any mediating," mediat-ing," Lee Hart sneered. "We're figuring fig-uring on wiping out this bunch of killers the cattle barons have brought in, and with them some of the high moguls, themselves." Bill Herriott was less ferocious "Hello!" and passed without question. ques-tion. Yancey was waiting at the edge of the aspens. "How is your U'3?" Terry asked. "Fine." the m;:n answered in a thin voice. "Let me look ai It." Carey said. While he exanvned and dressed it as best he could. Terry tooU the horse deeper in!n the aspens where it would not be seen. Carey called him when he v.-ys ready. The Box 55 n ;n said in a low voice. "This rmin can't make it alone to the railroad. " Terry frowned "I've been thinking think-ing that. I'll go with him. Later on we'll pick up another horse somewhere." some-where." "You mean, both go on this horse?" "Yes. He isn't going to make it without help " Yancey spoke up stoutly, but in a weak voice. "1 am too. Boost me into the saddle and I'll burn the wind out of here " They helped h:m to his feet. He leaned heavily against Terry. The eyes of the ranchmen met. Eafb was telling the other that the Texan would not get far alone. Out of the darkness a man walked. He asked peremptorily, "What you fellows doing here?" (TO HE CONTINUED) |