CHAPTER X.

AT DOUBLE CROSS RANCH.

The first words spoken by Ned added to the puzzle, for he turned to his chums and propounded a question.

"Did any of you happen to notice which way the pigeon was flying, before the hawk darted out from the trees and chased it?"

"Yes," Jack informed him promptly, "I saw the bird coming away in the distance, and it was flying as straight as an arrow, when the hawk shot up out of the screen of the trees and made it swerve to try and escape; but it wasn't quick enough."

"Which way was it coming then?" asked Ned.

Jack pointed toward the southeast.

"Right yonder and in the same direction we're heading," he replied.

Ned frowned and looked even more serious.

"Then it begins to look as though this messenger pigeon might have been freed from somewhere about your uncle's ranch, Harry, and was making for its coop when the hawk killed it. You know they've been known to fly hundreds and hundreds of miles, even from New York to Pittsburgh, and arrive safe, tired, and half-starved after a couple of days."

"It always did beat my time how they did it," said Jack, "though what you say is true, every word of it, Ned. But what is there so stunning about the fact of this bird having been set loose at the ranch? Some puncher may be a homing pigeon fancier and sends a bird to his home, many miles away, once in so often. It would be a great little stunt, I should think."

"Yes, ditto here," added Harry, "so tell us why you think it's queer, Ned."

"On account of the message," replied the scout master.

"Well, we don't know what that is, so read it out!" urged Jack.

"All right, I will," Ned told them, and then glancing down once more at the thin piece of paper he held he continued: "'Some talk of both bosses going to W. soon. Be ready to act. Will let you know in time! Chances good for big sweep! We count five!'"

"Glory hallelujah! what's all that patter mean?" gasped Jimmy, who seemed unable to make head or tail out of the communication.

Jack and Harry, however, realized that Ned was about right when he said it looked as though there might be more in the message than appeared on the bare face.

"You notice that it says _two_ bosses, don't you?" asked Ned.

"Yes, and that must refer to my two uncles, Colonel Job Haines and James Henshaw?" Harry suggested.

"What does the W mean?" asked Jack.

"I think that must be a town on the railroad, where they ship the cattle in season," replied Ned.

"'Be ready to act,' it goes on to say," Jack continued, "which would make it appear as though the writer knew there was some sort of a raid contemplated."

"A raid!" echoed Jimmy, "faith, d'ye mean by rustlers?"

"That's the only kind of raid cattlemen fear nowadays, since the wild animals have been well cleaned out and the reds stick to their reservations pretty much all the time," Harry informed him, "but just to think of what this would stand for, if it's true."

"A traitor or traitors employed at the Double Cross Ranch," the scout master declared. "Well that wouldn't be the first time such a thing had happened. In fact, these cattle rustlers usually have means for learning all that is going on with the punchers. In that way, they manage to time their raids when most of the hands are away. Seems that there might be quite a bunch of the hounds, because he mentions the fact that the party he's sending the message to can count on five to muss things up at the time the raid is engineered."

Harry laughed grimly.

"Perhaps, now, my Uncle Job won't be tickled half to death to get hold of this telltale message!" he gurgled. "If only he can find who wrote the same, it'll turn out to be his Waterloo, believe me, if half I've heard about Uncle Job is true."

"And that ought to be easy," remarked Jack.

"You mean, he could tell from the handwriting?" Harry demanded.

"Yes, but there would be a better way than that," the other scout continued, as he gave Ned a knowing nod.

"'Tis the pigeon, you must mean!" exclaimed Jimmy.

"That's it," Jack acknowledged, "and surely a fellow couldn't keep birds like that and set one flying every once in so often, without others knowing about it. Find the puncher who's got the homing pigeon fancy and you'll have the leader of the spies at the Double Cross, if that's where the bird started from."

The scout master nodded his head approvingly.

"That was well figured out, Jack," he said, "and did your scout logic credit. A scout has got to keep his wits sharpened and not let anything slip past him, no matter how small it may seem. Of course, the owner of the pigeon must be guilty; and, just as you say, it wouldn't be easy for him to carry on with his birds unless most of the other punchers knew about it."

"But the message?" Jimmy objected.

"Oh! they didn't see this one, but another that the fellow would be smart enough to get up, and _pretend_ to fasten to the leg of the air traveler," Jack went on to say, in a way that showed how his mind had grasped the subject.

Ned carefully folded the tissue paper and put it safely away in his pocketbook.

"That was the luckiest shot you ever made, I take it, Jimmy," he remarked, turning to the freckled-faced chum, who immediately puffed his chest out in a ridiculous fashion and began to pretend to take on airs.

"Oh! the rest of you can do some stunts once in a coon's age," he told them, "but when it comes right down to taking the cake, you have to apply to your Uncle Jimmy. I managed to land there with both feet. Luck and me, we're bedfellers, you see. But then, far from me 'twould be to boast. It was a fair shot, Ned, I admit it. And the McGraw luck held good."

"You'll have to let me in on a little of that, Jimmy," Jack told him, "because you happened to be using my shoulder at the time, remember. Only for that, chances are you'd have lost the hawk and we'd never have known that it was a homer he had caught for his lunch.

"Shake on that, Jack; you're in," Jimmy was quick to say.

"But we'd better be going on, hadn't we?" Harry asked. "Because I'm more anxious now than ever to pull up at the ranch house."

"Yes," Ned informed them, "we've got a long walk ahead of us yet. I'll do up the pigeon and the hawk to show your uncle, on the quiet, when there's no one else around. You see, he's apt to think we may be yarning, because it's a queer and fishy story, come to think of it; and the more proof we have the better."

"Takes you to look away ahead," declared Jack; "now, like as not, I'd have tossed both birds away and then wished I hadn't later on. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, they say. The fellow who can think ahead takes the cake."

"Then I'm goin' to get busy and be that feller," Jimmy assured them, "because I always did like cake."

The forward march was resumed, with the three burros plodding along after their accustomed slow method of travel. They had to be urged frequently, with the tickle of a whip. The only times they showed traces of eagerness were when approaching places where water could be had, and then they almost ran.

As the afternoon wore along, the scouts knew that they were drawing near a cattle ranch. Many things told them this pleasing news. They found tracks of droves all about them on the grassy plain, and three times had they glimpsed a feeding herd in the swale, where some low hills joined the more level ground.

"I can see houses among the trees ahead there!" announced Ned, after he had had the field glasses up to his eye for a short time.

All of them wanted to take a look, then, and great was the rejoicing when it was found to be true.

"About two miles more of this weary hiking, and then good-bye to it!" Jack gave as his opinion, in which the other joined.

They took a fresh start after that, and it was not long before Jimmy declared he could see a bunch of riders starting out from the trees and heading toward them.

"They've sighted us," asserted Ned, "and, of course, wonder who we can be; because Harry here thought to take his uncles by surprise and didn't tell them when to expect us, except to say, we'd probably drop in on the ranch if down this way."

"You see," Harry went on to explain, "when I wrote last, it was from Los Angeles; and, about that time, I didn't feel so sure we'd ever get through alive."

"First time I knew you felt worried," Ned told him. "All of you seemed so dead set on carrying out the programme that I couldn't say what I thought."

"You must mean," Jack said, "that it looked silly and foolish to think we could cross the deserts and mountain canyons in that old rantankerous automobile?"

Ned laughed.

"Never mind what I thought," he remarked. "It's too late now to cry over spilt milk. We got through, didn't we? And we've had experiences that will always stay with us. That's enough. And, at last, we can see our goal just ahead."

"Hurrah for the Double Cross Ranch!" exclaimed Jimmy.

The half-dozen cowboys came whirling toward them, shouting, swinging their hats, and riding as only punchers on the plains can.

"Remember, everybody," warned Ned, "not a word about that hawk and pigeon episode."

"We understand what you mean, Ned," Harry replied.

Presently the mad riders came galloping up in a cloud of alkali dust.

"Told you so, boys!" cried a tall rangy fellow, who sat his pony as though he might be a part of the animal--one of those Centaurs of old. "Ketch on to the scout togs, would you? Say, are you Harry Stevens?"

He had unconsciously picked out Ned when asking this question, because he must have somehow seen that he was the leader; perhaps, it was partly from his looks; and, then again, the fact that Ned had no burro to take care of, while all his companions did, may have had something to do with it.

"No, but I'm his chum, Ned Nestor. That's Harry over yonder, and I reckon now that we're glad to be at the Double Cross."

"But where'd you come from, pard?" demanded the cowboy, who had thrown one leg over his saddle, the better to talk.

"Los Angeles," replied Ned, indifferently.

At that the punchers stared and even exchanged various winks and nods.

"Not with them lazy burros, I opine, pard?" ventured the spokesman.

"Oh! no, we picked these up in the hills, buying them from prospectors, who had had enough and were meaning to go home," Ned informed him.

"That was after our automobile broke down and had to be abandoned, in the middle of the Mojave Desert," Harry volunteered.

The cow-puncher gave a whistle to indicate his surprise. Ned noticed that his manner had changed somewhat, too. Doubtless, because these boys were from the East and somewhat green with regard to ranch ways, he may have imagined, in the beginning, that they were genuine tenderfeet.

He knew better now. Any party of boys who could by themselves cross that terrible Mojave Desert and make their way down to this country bordering the Colorado River, must surely be made of the right stuff.

"Get up behind me, Ned, and ride the rest of the way; proud to have you join us. And we reckons as how we'll give you the time of your life while you're at the old Double Cross Ranch."

Ned promptly accepted this invitation on the part of the lanky puncher, whom he heard called "Chunky," probably because he was just the opposite; while a real fat roly-poly sort of a rider answered, when they addressed him as "Skinny," which made it look as though these boys might have drawn the wrong slips out of the hat at the ranch christening.

Jack, Harry and Jimmy were all similarly accommodated with seats, while two other punchers promised to see that the pack animals got in.

A wild ride they made of those two miles. The scouts clasped their arms around their new friends and held on for dear life; but none of them fell off and presently they found themselves in front of the ranch house.

"Sorry to tell ye, Harry," announced the lanky puncher, "that both your uncles, together with a couple of the boys, has headed for the railroad, to fetch home a bunch of imported stock they sent for, meaning to improve the breed of our long horns. So ye'll have to wait two days or so before you see 'em; but Aunt Mehitabel, she's inside, and will make you all welcome, sure thing."

With that the four punchers were off again, doubtless to attend to some of the duties they were hired to perform.

The four boys stood there exchanging significant looks, as the sun drew near the distant western horizon.

"Looks some serious, don't it?" remarked Harry.

"Both bosses have gone away just as that message said," Jack observed. "I wonder, now, if these conspirators will try to send another communication to their rustler friends."

"I'm afraid that has already been done," Ned told them, "and we were powerless to stop it. Because just as we rode up, I saw a pigeon flying in by circles high up in the air; then, as if it had gotten its bearings, it went off on a straight line into the northwest. That bird must have carried the news that the time to strike had come."