CHAPTER XI.

THE SHEEP AND THE GOATS.

The scouts were now confronted by conditions calculated to keep them guessing at a lively rate. With both owners of the ranch away, to whom were they to communicate their alarming news? How could they know that in this telling the story, they might not be giving themselves away to one of the suspects?

It was a situation calling for considerable head work and reasoning, so that a serious mistake might not be made in the start.

What made it still more difficult to manage was the fact, which Harry seemed to be aware of, that there was no real foreman on the place; Colonel Job himself filling that position, while James Henshaw took other duties upon his shoulders.

"How about telling your Aunt Mehitabel about it, Harry?" Ned asked, as they exchanged views and seemed to get no nearer a definite arrangement.

"Just what we'll have to do," replied the other chum, "and say, if only she'll agree to let us have a free hand, and tell the boys to do what we want, p'raps we might find some way yet to upset the game of the rustlers."

"You just bet we will that!" said Jimmy, with all the confidence of one whose lexicon knew no such word as fail.

"The first thing we must do," ventured Ned, seriously, "is to find out who it is sends these treacherous messages to parties that have evil designs on the herds of the Double Cross Ranch."

"Them, you mean, don't you, Ned," added Jack, "because that message spoke of there being five all told who would look out and see that things were made easy picking."

"Well," spoke up Jimmy, with a cunning leer, "sometimes you think I'm sleepy, but I notice that now and then I manage to wake up long enough to do my little stunt. His handle, it's Ally Sloper, by the same token."

"Who's that?" asked Harry.

"The dub that owns the homing pigeons," came the ready reply, which caused Ned to smile and nod his head in approbation.

"Good work, Jimmy!" he remarked, "you must have asked the fellow you rode in behind?"

"Just what I did, Ned," Jimmy told him. "I mentioned the fact that we had seen a pigeon flying, and then he says as how this same Ally Sloper he had got about five birds from a feller over in Kingman, on the railroad beyond the Opal and the Blue Ridge Mountains down in Arizona. He was told to let one go every little while, to see if they'd get safe home again. But, fellers, that place lies to the southeast as you know, and we saw that pigeon away off to the _northwest_ of here, which says Ally Sloper he just lies!"

"That's a fine start," commended the scout master. "We know who the chief spy is, and it ought to be an easy thing to learn who his close pals seem to be, for like as not he'd stick only to those who are in the same boat with him."

"Sounds well to me, Ned," Jack remarked, after apparently turning the matter over carefully in his mind.

"What's the game?" asked Jimmy.

"Here's the way it stands," remarked Ned, soberly. "That second message must have been sent to tell the gang that both bosses are away, and conditions looking good for a raid to-night."

"Whew! so soon as that?" ejaculated Jack, drawing a long sigh, for he was pretty tired and had calculated on getting rested up between sunset and another dawn; if, as they suspected, there were going to be great goings-on around the cattle ranch before many hours, it was possible that they might be on the jump all night; but then, Jack was a fellow who could stand considerable punishment without throwing up the sponge, and that intake of breath might simply mean a resolution to do his part in the drama.

"If there was only some way now to round the cattle up and drive them into the stockades or corrals, so they could be guarded," Ned continued, as though he might have been doing more or less planning before the critical moment arrived, "why, we might hold the fort until morning and not lose any of the herds."

"Do you suppose it could be done?" Harry wanted to know.

"I see no reason why not," came the sturdy reply. "It looked to me like the herds were grazing within a few miles of here, though there may be some further off. Now, if the punchers only got the fever on them, I've no doubt they could round the steers and cows up and get them in the stockade long before the rustlers would think of coming along."

"There's one bully thing about it," ventured Harry, smilingly. "We're going to have a full moon to-night, and a cattle drive will be a picnic. If it was pitch dark, or stormy, it might be a different story. The scout luck holds good. Things may look a bit gloomy for a while, but we get there in the end."

"I'll tell you one reason why it's important that we should find out just who the cronies of this Ally Sloper are," continued Ned. "It would be a bad thing now if we sent the whole five out in a batch, because, believing their game was up and that it would be unsafe for them to ever come back here, chances are they would take advantage of their opportunity to run off a herd while about it."

"Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb--is that what you mean, Ned?" Jack asked.

"Yes, about that way," the scout master replied. "On the other hand, if they are broken up, and only one sent out with each bunch of punchers to corral the herds, these spies will not be able to work anything crooked. We'll draw their claws, as you might say, and make them harmless."

"Here comes my aunt," Harry broke in with, as a large woman brushed out of the doorway of the commodious ranch house and approached them.

She was an amiable woman, they could see at first glance; but Ned fancied that, in an emergency, Aunt Mehitabel would not prove capable of gripping the reins. No doubt, during all her married life she had depended on her able husband to manage things on the outside, being content on her part to see that things moved along regularly within doors, and that meals came on time.

She greeted Harry warmly and was also delighted to meet his chums, all of whom she urged to go inside the house with her.

But the occasion was so serious that Ned did not wish to waste any more time than was absolutely necessary.

"We've come to make you quite a little visit, ma'm," Ned remarked, after she had urged them to make themselves at home, and do whatever they pleased, "and later on we expect to have a great time riding around the country and seeing things. But it is unfortunate that neither one of Harry's uncles is home right now, because we've got some very important news."

The lady of the house looked worried at once, just as Ned had anticipated would be the case.

"Oh! what can it be?" she asked, her voice showing traces of nervousness.

"On the way our chum, Jimmy here, happened to shoot a hawk that had pounced down on a flying pigeon. Wrapped around one of the pigeon's legs was a piece of tissue paper, and bearing a message. I have it here with me, and both the hawk and the pigeon are in one of our packs on the burros. This message was not signed, but it plainly announced that there are five untrustworthy men employed on this place who are in league with cattle rustlers."

"Mercy on us, you don't say! And the colonel away, too! Whatever will become of us now?" Mrs. Haines started to wail, when Ned smilingly went on to soothe her by remarking:

"But here are four stout boys, ready to do their level best to upset the plans of these cattle thieves, if given half a chance, ma'm. Now, in this message, it is promised that if the conditions look favorable, another line will be sent, the same way as this was. And as we came up we saw a pigeon flying into the west, so we take it for granted that has been done, and the rustler crowd will get busy between now and sun-up."

"The herds are all out on the range, unfortunately, and it is too late now to get them in," the lady went on to say, dejectedly. "Oh! how unfortunate that you did not arrive a few hours ago, when my husband would have been here to take charge of things, for we have no foreman, you know."

"It may not be too late, even now, to get the herds rounded up and brought in to the corral where the boys can guard them," Ned told her.

She looked at him admiringly, doubtless impressed, as many others had been before then, with his manly bearing and the resolute look on his face.

"I really believe that if any one could manage it, you could, my son!" she said, with a simplicity and ardor that caused the warm glow to spread over Ned's face.

"With what assistance you might give us, Mrs. Haines, we believe we can save the cattle from this threatened raid," he continued, calmly. "And first of all it is of the utmost importance that we learn just who these other four punchers may be who are hand in glove with Ally Sloper--the man who has sent the pigeon messenger."

"Oh! so he is the one?" she cried, "and I never could bear the sight of his face, because of the cast in that evil eye of his. But Job always laughed at me, and said Ally Sloper was one of the best men he had on the place. What do you want me to do, for you said I could help you win out?"

"First of all, in the absence of your husband and Harry's other uncle," began the scout master, just for all the world, Jimmy thought, like a great general, such as Napoleon or Grant, laying out his campaign, "it seems as if the men would take orders from you. Am I right there?

"Yes, it has happened a few times, but I would not have known a thing about what to do, only for Chunky's advice," she told him.

"Oh! you can rely on Chunky then, can you?" asked Ned, quickly, for that was one of the points he wanted settled, because a great deal depended on it.

"Always. My husband would trust him with his life. If ever we do have a foreman at the Double Cross, Chunky will be the one."

"I'm glad to hear that, because I rode in behind him, and somehow I fancied he would be the one to confide in. Please send out for him as soon as you can, ma'm, because we have little time to waste. I hope to learn from Chunky just who the other four traitors are, for he will have noticed how this Ally Sloper picks out his friends. Birds of a feather flock together, you know; and these fellows would feel safer if they kept in constant touch with each other."

The other scouts approved of what Ned was doing, as their manner of nodding at different times indicated. They knew that their leader was equal to running things, even though he might not know so much about the working of a cattle ranch. And in times gone by they had seen him pitted against what seemed to be overwhelming odds, to win out in the end; so that they had unbounded confidence in whatever he started to do.

The rancher's wife left them for a minute, and presently came back to say that she had sent out the Chink cook, Chin-chin Charlie, to find Chunky, and tell him to come right to the house on important business.

"We'll get this working pretty soon, I think," Jack declared, with animation.

"And they'll just have to hunt up some broncs for the lot of us to straddle, too," added Harry.

"Tell me about that," chuckled Jimmy. "How glad I'll be to mount a fiery charger and dig me heels into his flanks, after all this terrible walkin' the lot of us have been doin' lately. I do be wishin' Chunky'd hurry. If he's gone off now, and couldn't be found at the bunkhouse, we'll be in a nice pickle, sure."

"Don't worry, because I think he's coming," Ned told him.

Just as he said, this lanky puncher came up on the verandah of the ranch. He was quickly put in possession of the facts, and expressed himself in forcible terms concerning the alleged treachery of Ally Sloper and his four allies.

"I c'n put a hand on the hull blooming lot," he declared, "because it happens as how that same Ally has been keepin' company with jest four punchers. They are Lefty Louie, Coyote Smith, Bob Caruso that the boys calls Robinson Crusoe, and Tinplate George--all clever punchers, but mighty slick articles at that. If Miss Haines sez as how we take our orders from you, Ned, just give the word, and you'll see them warts arounded up like grease."

"Oh! well, we ought to go to extremes only as a last resort, I think," said Mrs Haines, who dreaded lest there be some shooting in making the arrest, and that some of the boys who were her favorites would get hurt. "Ned has a plan that might answer the same purpose. Tell him about it, Ned, please."

So the scout master unfolded his scheme.

"How many herds are there on the range just now, Chunky?" he asked.

"Four, all told, with a smattering of others that don't 'mount to much."

"Suppose, then, you make me out a list of the punchers, so that there will be one of these suspects with every bunch, not counting Ally Sloper," Ned continued.

"Hello! I'm beginnin' to tumble to the game and, let me say, it fills the bill first-class," was the quick comment of the lanky one.

He gave the names to Ned as rapidly as the other could write them down; and it was speedily arranged, so that of the four parties one of the conspirators had been designated to accompany each. As for Ally himself, it did not matter much what he did, though they must keep him under surveillance, lest he upset all their cleverly laid plans by cutting the corral or, in some other fashion, rendering it impossible to keep all the hundreds of longhorns near the ranch house, where they could be guarded.

All this was fixed up in a very short space of time and then Ned declared they ought to get busy. The sun was sinking toward the western horizon; but they knew there was going to be no period of darkness, because the moon was full, which meant that it would rise exactly at sunset.

"We can eat after we've got those herds rounded up and safe in the corral, not before," was Ned's ultimatum, when Mrs. Haines spoke about supper; and this caused one long face to make itself seen among the scouts, for Jimmy dearly loved his feed.