So he trudged st.u.r.dily on through the heavy sand of the flats, building air castles and nursing his wrath, but paying little heed to the course he was taking, until with a shiver of alarm he discovered that the afternoon sun had set and the range of white-capped mountains which sheltered Crystal City was seemingly no nearer than when he had set out. He began to feel faint with hunger and thirst, and was appalled to think he had forgotten in his flight to pack any lunch in his small store of belongings, and was now what seemed miles from civilization, in the midst of the pathless desert with neither food nor drink, and night coming on.

Night! He shuddered. How could he have forgotten the night part of it? Where was he to stay? He was afraid of the desert darkness.

Somehow, it always seemed blacker and stiller there than anywhere else on earth. But perhaps the moon would come up. That would be lots of company, and the weather was so warm that he would really enjoy sleeping out in the open air. Eagerly he scanned the evening sky, and perceiving that the east appeared to be growing lighter, his spirits began to rise. After all, he was not sorry he had run away. Wouldn't there be consternation in the Eagles' Nest when his absence was discovered? How Tabitha would regret her unwarranted harshness! And Toady--Toady would cry and snivel because he had deserted his dear, big brother in his hour of need. And searching parties would be sent all over the country to find him. How he gloated over the pictures his vivid imagination had drawn!

But all the while he stumbled on, it was growing darker, the landscape had become an indistinct blur, and night sounds filled the air. The lonely howl of a wolf in the distance sent a chill of fear down Billiard's spine; the scream of a night-hawk overhead made him jump almost out of his shoes, and he was just beginning to consider where he should lie down to sleep when a sudden scurry in the underbrush froze him in his tracks. The next minute, however, he laughed at his fright, for it was merely a mother burro and her baby colt which his steps had routed from their hiding-place and sent flying across the flats for safety. A twig snapping sharply under his feet startled him; what sounded like a warning hiss close by brought his heart into his mouth; and trembling from head to foot he paused by a clump of Spanish bayonets, uncertain what to do next.

Oh, if only he had not run away! If only he were sitting with the rest of the lively troop of children around the supper table! Or perhaps it was too late for supper now. More likely they would be preparing for bed. What frolics they had enjoyed in the evenings when Tabitha made taffy and recited stirring ballads to fill in the moments while the toothsome sweet was cooking. What exciting tales his cousins told of the brave, black-haired maid whom he was trying so hard to hate. He did hate her! That is, sometimes he did. But he could not help admiring her pluck, even though he stood in awe of the fierce temper that blazed up so quickly, and as quickly died away again. She was certainly a wonder for a girl. There was no 'fraid cat about her. He wished she liked him better. But how could she, when he was so tantalizing, mean and sly? Perhaps if he went back home, that is, to Aunt----

"Hands up! We've got you at last!" growled a stern voice almost in his ear, it seemed; and poor Billiard's hands shot high into the air, he shut his eyes, held his breath and waited for the end. But to his utter amazement, a second voice huskily replied, after an instant, "Yes, you've got me, boys. I knew it was no use to run away, but--I--couldn't bear--to stay--and know that everyone looked at me as a thief. I never took the money."

The moon, which had seemed so slow in rising, had finally mounted to the crest of the surrounding hills, and poured a stream of mellow light upon the waste below. Billiard, his hands still thrust stiffly above his head, now distinguished a few feet in front of him the dark shapes of a dozen or more men, armed with revolvers, cl.u.s.tering around one whom he recognized as At.w.a.ter, the runaway post-master of Silver Bow.

"That's all right, At.w.a.ter," growled the first speaker, who was evidently leader of the posse. "Tell your tale in court, but be a man and face the music. Fall in, boys!"

For a long time, Billiard watched them as they marched their hapless prisoner back to town, and the leader's words kept ringing in his ears, "Be a man and face the music!" Suddenly a new thought flashed through his brain. Why had he not followed them? It wasn't too late yet. He could still see their forms indistinctly moving across the desert, and by following their lead, would sooner or later reach Silver Bow himself. Stepping out from the clump of Spanish bayonets which had formed his retreat, he set out on a dog-trot in the direction the men had taken, and after a long, rough, weary journey, actually found himself trailing up the familiar path to the Eagles' Nest.

He paused as he reached the children's play house and took a furtive survey of the place. One lone light burned in the low cottage.

Probably Tabitha had missed him and was waiting for his return.

Supposing she should lick him again for running away?

"Billiard!"

'Twas only a whisper from a rock nearby? but the boy almost screamed aloud in his fright at the unexpectedness of it.

"Sh!" the voice continued. "It's only I,--Glory. I had to go to the drug-store for some alum,--Janie has the croup,--and I saw you coming up the trail. Tabitha hasn't missed you yet. She has been so anxious over the baby. So sneak back to your room and I'll bring you something to eat as soon as I can. Run now! Tabitha will be expecting me."

"But Glory, doesn't _anyone_ know I--" began bewildered Billiard, much taken back at his reception.

"Ran away?" finished Gloriana. "No one but Toady and myself. He won't tell. I made him promise. Of course we'd have had to, if you hadn't come back, but I knew--I thought you would--" How could she tell him that she knew he was too much of a coward to persist in running away?

"Scramble into your room as quietly as possible," she continued, "so as not to disturb the others, and I will bring you some supper in a minute or so."

"You're--you're awfully good to a feller," mumbled the abashed boy, wondering how he ever could have disliked the red-haired Glory.

"I--I'll not forget it." And as the girl hurried up the path to the kitchen door, he skirted the house till he reached the window of his room, through which he wriggled cautiously and disappeared in the friendly darkness within, thankful that he was home again.

CHAPTER IX

BILLIARD SURRENDERS

Toady kept his promise not to mention Billiard's runaway expedition to anyone else save Gloriana; but being human, he could not keep from twitting his brother occasionally, and the days which followed that memorable night were full of misery for the unhappy boy. His cousins avoided him, Tabitha ignored him, Toady tormented him, and even Gloriana seemed indifferent to his plight. In his fright at discovering himself lost on the desert at night, he had resolved to follow Toady's example and turn over a new leaf. He could not quite make up his mind to confess his sins to eagle-eyed Tabitha, but was really sincere in his desire to do better; and was as surprised as he was disappointed to find that no one paid any attention to the sudden change in his deportment.

"Might as well have kept on being bad," he growled with an injured air one afternoon when a fortnight had pa.s.sed without any noticeable change in the atmosphere. "Wish I hadn't come back that night. Guess they'd have sung a different tune then! Maybe a coyote would have got me, or I'd have stepped into a rattlesnake's nest and been stung to death.

Bet they'd have felt sorry when they found me--," he hesitated. His picture was too vivid, and he shuddered as he thought what a fate would have been his had a rattlesnake bitten him as he tramped across the pathless waste in his flight. "Pretty near dead," he finished finally, unable to endure the thought that they _might_ have found him dead.

"If I had kept on, I'd be in Los Angeles now,--maybe in the navy already. I've a good notion to try again. I could almost go by train, now that my 'lowance has come. Mercy says it takes twelve dollars, and I've got ten. 'T any rate, I could ride as far as that would take me, and--by George, I b'lieve I could beat my way without spending a cent!

That's the way tramps travel from city to city."

He winced at the idea of being cla.s.sed with tramps, and fell to debating whether he would buy a ticket and ride like a gentleman as far as his ten dollars would carry him, or whether he would attempt the hobo's hazardous method of transportation. Before he had arrived at any satisfactory conclusion, he heard the tramp of feet close by, and the lively chatter of voices, and around the bend of the path came Toady with his six cousins. They did not see him at first, half hidden as he was by the heap of ragged rocks on which he lay stretched full length, but even when they did become aware of his presence, they merely glanced indifferently at the lazy figure and pa.s.sed by without speaking.

Angered at thus being ignored and left out in the cold, Billiard resolved to display no interest in them, either, although he was consumed with curiosity as to where they were bound; but a chance remark of Susie's about being lowered in a bucket overcame his resolve, and he called after them, "Where you going, kids?"

"Don't you wish you knew?" Inez flung back with a saucy toss of her head.

"Up Pike's Peak," said Toady, without so touch as looking back.

"You mean down Ali Baba's cave," suggested Mercedes laughingly.

"Shall we tell him?" asked Irene, relenting as she glanced back at the lonely figure on the rocks.

"He'll just be bad if we let him come," warned Susie.

"He hasn't been bad for a long time," gentle Irene reminded them.

"Aw, what do you s'pose I care where you are going?" sung out Billiard, more hurt by their manner than he cared to acknowledge. "Keep on to Jericho, if you want to."

"We ain't going to Jericho," said Irene, lagging uncertainly behind the others. "Only just across town to that hill over there where is a--a 'bandoned mine. Toady's never seen what one looks like, so we're taking him along to get a peek at it. Have you ever seen a mine?"

Billiard shook his head.

"Tabitha says if we're real good, she'll see if the superintendent won't take us all through the Silver Legion mine before the summer is over; but to-day we're just going to show Toady how the miners go up and down the shaft. He won't b'lieve they use a bucket. Don't you want to come too?"

"Nope, guess not," Billiard answered promptly, though the wistful look in his eyes belied his words.

"It's int'resting," urged Irene, who somehow seemed to understand that Billiard did not really mean what he said.

"Is it a real bucket?" he could not refrain from asking.

"Yes."

"Like a water bucket?"

"Yes, only bigger."

"I sh'd think the miners would fall out."

"Oh, it's big enough so they can't tumble if they mind the rules; but you've got to keep your head down inside, or you'll be killed by the big beans--" she meant beams--"which are built in to hold the dirt from caving in and filling up the mine. Come and see for yourself."

"Well, p'r'aps I will." With a great show of indifference, the boy uncoiled his legs, slid to the ground beside Irene, and hurried with her after the others, now a considerable distance in advance; but the little group had reached their goal and were gingerly peering into the black depths of the abandoned shaft when Billiard and Irene joined them.

"Ugh!" shuddered Mercedes, drawing back with a shiver from the yawning mouth of the hole. "It smells like lizards. I'll bet the bottom of the shaft is full of them."

"It didn't use to be," remarked Susie, dropping a pebble over the brink and listening to the hollow echoes it awoke as it bounded from timber to timber.

"Were you ever down there?" asked Toady in surprise.

"No, but papa was one of the men here when the mine was working."