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Pony Rider Boys in the Alkali

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<h3> CHAPTER XV </h3> <h4> BUD PROMISES SOME EXCITEMENT </h4> The horse-hunter and his young companion laid their course at right angles to the reach of the range. The trail rose slowly to pass between low buttes, leading on under the great spreading Joshua trees that capped the range itself. Off to the east and south of them, plainly exposed to view, lay the yellow stretch of the Ralston Valley that went on and on until it eventually terminated in Death Valley. The dry lake beds in the desert, looked, with the sun shining on them, like great pearls set in the Desert Maze. Tad thought they were water, but Bud Stevens informed him that they were filled with water only after a heavy thunderstorm, or in the early spring. "You ought to have come down here earlier in the season," he told the lad. "It's a pretty bad time to cross the desert now." "Yes, we know that. But we are not looking for easy trips," laughed the lad. As they moved slowly along, the cowboy horse-hunter explained many of the secrets of the trail to his young companion, as well as describing horse-hunts in which he had taken part in the past. "But I don't understand why they have come all the way across the desert to get into this range?" said Tad. "Why did they not remain on the other side where, I understand, there is plenty of forage?" "It's a peculiar thing, kiddie, but hosses, wild or tame are like human beings in some ways. They like to get back home." "What do you mean?" "Wild horses always will go back to the range where they were born. Sometimes they run away from the range ahead of a storm; sometimes they are captured and taken away. But if they ever get the chance, back they go to the place where they were born. Angel was born in this range, and so were most of the mares and others that have come over with him. When a halfbreed Cherokee came into camp and told us the band of horses was seen stretched out on the mesa on the other side, I knew they were getting ready to hike across the desert, so we prepared to come here." Tad was listening intently. All this was new to him and much of it not entirely understandable. "Did you ever notice how animals act before a big storm?" asked Bud. "No; I can't say that I have." "Next time you see a lot of horses stretched out on the ground on their sides, heads close to the ground, all looking as if they were asleep, you'll know there's a big storm coming." "Why do they do that?" "I don't know, unless it is to rest themselves thoroughly before running away from the storm that they know is coming." "How do they know a storm is coming, unless they can see it?" marveled the boy. "Kiddie, you'll have to ask the horses. Bud Stevens don't know—nobody knows. A fellow with whiskers and wearing spectacles one of—of them scientific gents—told me once that it was a kind of wireless telegraph, that newfangled way of sending ghost messages. Said they got it in the air. Mebby they do; I don't know. They get it. Sometimes you'll see the colts running up and down. That's another sign of storm." "That's strange. I never heard it before," mused the lad. "And speaking of colts, did you ever know that sometimes a band of horses will take a great fancy to a frisky young colt?" "No." "Yes. They'll follow the colt for days, with their eyes big and full of admiration for the awkward critter. And they'll fight for him too. But 'tisn't often necessary, 'cause very few horses will bother a colt. Ever see a hoss fight?" Tad admitted that he had not. "Ought to see one. It's the liveliest scrimmage that you ever set eyes on. Beats that one back there on the desert, when you plunked me on my head in a water hole. Jimminy! but you did dump me proper," grinned the cowboy. "Hope you don't lay it up against me," laughed Tad. "No. Got all over that. I got what was coming to me—coming on the run. Say, got the trail on your side there? They seem to have shuffled over to the northward a bit." "Yes, I'm riding on their footprints now." "That's all right then. Don't want to let it get away from us." "Where do you think they are heading, Mr. Stevens?" "For the mesas up the range further. There's plenty of grazing there and there must be water close by. What we want to do, to-day, is to locate them and find out just where they go for their water. Then, when the schooner gets down to your camp, we'll haul our outfit up in the range and build a corral to drive them into." "Do you always make a capture?" "Us? No. Sometimes the leaders of the band are too smart for us. They beat us proper. Why, they're sharper than a Goldfield real estate man, and those fellows would make you believe an alkali desert was a pine forest." "Look there!" interrupted Tad, pointing. "What is it, kiddie?" demanded the horse-hunter, pulling up sharply. "One of the horses, I think it must be the leader, seems to have left the trail here and started off at right angles." Stevens rode over to the other side of Tad, and gazed down, his forehead wrinkling in a frown. "Yes, that's the Angel. Don't know what he's side-tracked himself here for. He can't see far, so it was not an observation that he was about to take. He's either seen or scented something. Hold my pony while I take a look." The cowboy dismounted, striding rapidly away with gaze fixed on the trail ahead of him. A few moments later he returned. "Find anything?" asked Tad. "The big one scented something, or thought he did." "But where did he go?" "Turned just beyond here and followed along the same way the others were going. You'll find his trail joining ours after we get on a piece. I'd like to know what he thought he smelled," mused Bud. "I didn't know horses could scent a person or thing like that." "What, horses? Wild horses have got a scent that's keener than a coyote's." "There's the white stallion's trail again," exclaimed the lad. Bud nodded. "Told you he'd come back." For the next hour they rode along without anything of incident occurring, Tad constantly adding to his store of knowledge regarding mountain and plain. The lad was himself a natural plainsman and proved himself an apt pupil. All at once Bud pulled up his pony sharply and studied the ground. "What is it?" questioned Tad. "We've struck luck for sure. Boy, I'll show you something that'll make your eyes stick out so you can hang your hat on them," cried the cowboy exultingly. "You—you mean we have come upon the wild horses?" asked the lad. "Yes, and more. Come this way and I'll show you. See this trail?" Tad nodded. "Well, it was made by another band of horses." The announcement did not strike Tad as especially significant. "They headed for the mesas, too?" "Looks that way," grinned Bud. "And they're headed for trouble at the same time. There's going to be music in the air pretty soon, kiddie, and you and I want to be on hand to hear the first tune." Tad gazed at him questioningly. "This second bunch of horses is led by a big black stallion known to the hunters as Satan. He's up to his name too. He's one of the most vicious cayuses on the open range. Don't you see what this trail means?" The lad confessed that he did not. "It means that Satan is on the trail of the Angel. When Satan and the Angel meet there'll be the worst scrap you ever heard of, kiddie." "Will they fight?" "Will they fight?" scoffed Bud Stevens. "Guess you never saw two wild stallions mix it up." "No." "There's bad blood between Satan and the Angel and there has been for a long time. The black stallion has been on the white one's trail for more than a year. I don't know what it's all about, but I know that, if they come up with each other, there is going to be trouble. If they don't look out we'll bag the whole bunch. I wish our outfit was here. I suppose we ought to hustle back and get ready for the drive, but I'm going to see Satan and the Angel meet, if it's the last thing I ever do. Come on—we'll have to ride fast." Putting spurs to their ponies, they set off at a fast pace over the uneven, rugged trail. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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