The Border Boys Across the Frontier.

by Fremont B. Deering.

CHAPTER I.

THE TRAIL OF THE HAUNTED MESA.

"Can you make out any sign of the mesa yet, Pete?"

The speaker, a sun-bronzed lad of about seventeen, mounted on a bright bay pony with a white-starred forehead, drew rein as he spoke. Shoving back his sombrero, he shielded his eyes from the shimmering desert glare with one hand and gazed intently off into the southwest.

"Nope; nary a speck, so fur. Queer, too; we ought to be seein' it by now."

Coyote Pete, as angular, rangy and sinewy as ever, gazed as intently in the same direction as the lad, Jack Merrill, himself. The pause allowed the remainder of the party to ride up. There was Ralph Stetson, a good deal browner and st.u.r.dier-looking than when we encountered him last in "The Border Boys on the Trail"; Walt Phelps, the ranch boy, whose blazing hair outrivaled the glowing sun; and the bony, grotesque form of Professor Wintergreen, preceptor of Latin and the kindred tongues at Stonefell College, and amateur archaeologist.

Lest they might feel slighted, let us introduce also, One Spot, Two Spot and Three Spot, the pack burros.

"I always had an idea that the Haunted Mesa formed quite a prominent object in the landscape," put in Professor Wintergreen, referring to a small leather-bound book, which he had just taken from one of his saddle-bags.

"And I always had an idea," laughed Ralph Stetson, "that a landscape meant something with brooks and green trees and cows and--and things, in it."

The young son of "King Pin" Stetson, the Eastern Railroad King, looked about him at the gray desert, above which the sun blazed mercilessly down with all the intensity of a burning gla.s.s. Here and there were isolated clumps of rank-odored mesquite, the dreariest looking gray-green bush imaginable. The scanty specimens of this variety of the vegetable life of the desert were interspersed here and there by groups of scraggly, p.r.i.c.kly cacti. Across such country as this, the party had been making its way for the past day and a half,--ever since, in fact, they had left behind them the foothills of the Hachetas, where, as we know, was located the ranch of Jack Merrill's father, and had entered the dry, almost untravelled solitudes of the Playas.

Jack Merrill consulted a compa.s.s that was strapped to his wrist.

"Well, we're keeping steadily in the right direction," he said.

"Nothing for it but to keep on going; eh, Pete?"

"When yer cain't turn back, 'keep on goin's' a good word," a.s.sented the philosophical cow-puncher of the Agua Caliente, stroking his sun-bleached yellow moustache and untangling a knot in his pony's mane.

"It's up to us to get somewhere where there is water pretty quick," put in Walt Phelps; "the last time I hit the little drinking canteen I noticed that there wasn't an awful lot left in the others."

"No, and the stock's feelin' it, too," grunted Pete, digging his big, blunt-roweled spurs into his buckskin cayuse.

Followed by Jack on his Firewater, the professor on his queer, bony steed as angular as himself, Ralph on Petticoats--of exciting memory,--and Walt Phelps on his big gray, they pushed on.

The heat was blistering. In fact, to any one less accustomed to the arduous intensity of the sun's rays in this part of the country, it would have proved almost insupportable. But our party was pretty well seasoned by this time.

All of them wore the broad, leather-banded sombreros of the plainsmen except Professor Wintergreen, who had invested himself in a gigantic pith sun-helmet, from beneath which his spectacled countenance peered out, as Ralph said, "Like a toad peeking out from a mushroom." For the rest, the boys wore leather "chaps," blue shirts open at the neck, with loosely knotted red handkerchiefs about their throats. The latter were both to keep the sun off the back of their necks and to serve as protection for their mouths and nostrils against the dust in case of necessity,--as for example, when they struck a patch of burning, biting alkali. Of this pungent stuff, they had already encountered one or two stretches, and had been glad to m.u.f.fle up the lower part of their faces as they rode through it.

As for Coyote Pete, those who have followed his earlier experiences are pretty familiar with that redoubtable cow-puncher's appearance; suffice it to say, therefore, that, as usual, he wore his battered leather "chaps," faded blue shirt, and his big sombrero with the silver stars affixed to the stamped leather band. In a holster he carried a rifle, as did the rest of the party, as well as his well-worn revolver. The others had provided themselves with similar weapons, although theirs glittered in blatant newness beside Pete's battered, but well-cleaned and oiled, "shootin' iron."

While they are pressing onward, with the Hachetas lying like a dim, blue cloud far behind them, let us tell the reader something about the quest that brings our party into the midst of this inhospitable place.

As readers of "The Border Boys on the Trail" know, Professor Wintergreen had accompanied Jack Merrill and Ralph Stetson from Stonefell College, some weeks before, to spend a vacation on the Agua Caliente Ranch, belonging to Jack's father. The professor, as well as being on a vacation, was in a sense on a mission, for he bore with him the commission of a well-known inst.i.tute of science in the East to investigate some of the mesas of this part of the world, and also to procure relics and trophies of the vanished race that once inhabited them, and accurate measurements of the strange formations.

Since their arrival at the ranch, some weeks before, events had so shaped themselves as to render the immediate undertaking of his mission impossible. The descent of Black Ramon de Barros on the ranch, as we have related, and the subsequent abduction of the boys to the old Mission across the border, had so fully occupied their attention, that all thought of the professor's errand had been lost sight of.

With Black Ramon, thanks to the boys, forever banished from his cattle-rustling raids, and the subsequent tranquility of routine life, had come a recollection of the professor's quest. Coyote Pete, a few days before this story opens, had volunteered to act as guide to the professor and his party to a mesa seldom visited except by wandering Indians and occasional cow-punchers. This was the Haunted Mesa, the location of which was so difficult to reach that previous relic-hunting expeditions had not included it in their travels.

Mr. Merrill was the more willing to allow the boys to go along, as he had been suddenly summoned into Chihuahua province, in Mexico, by reports of trouble at a mine--The Esmeralda--he owned there. Rumors of an insurrection had reached him--an insurrection which meant great peril to American interests. He had, therefore, lost no time in setting out to ascertain the true state of affairs at his mine, which, while a small one, was still likely to develop in time into an extremely valuable property.

Leaving the ranch in charge of Bud Wilson, he had started for the Mexican country without waiting for the departure of the professor's expedition. A short time later, "Professor Wintergreen's Haunted Mesans," as the boys insisted on calling themselves, had likewise started on their quest. With them, at Jack Merrill's invitation, went Walter Phelps, the son of a ranching neighbor of Mr. Merrill. Walt, it will be recalled, had shared the perils and adventures of the boys across the border, as related in the previous volume, and had been the instrument of piloting them out of the mysterious valley in which Black Ramon kept his plundered herds.

Mr. Merrill's last words had been ones of caution.

"Remember, boys, that if this trouble in Mexico attains real proportions, life and property along the border may be in great danger.

In such a case, it will be your immediate duty to turn back."

"But, Dad," Jack had said, "you don't expect that plundering insurrectos would have the audacity to come northward into the Playas?"

Mr. Merrill laughed.

"I didn't say there was any danger even here, my boy. Least of all, out in that barren country. If there is an insurrection, it will doubtless be put down without any trouble, but it is always well to be prepared."

Like his brother ranchers along the border, Mr. Merrill at that time had no idea of the seriousness or extent of the insurrection. Had he had, he would, of course, have prohibited the party leaving the ranch.

As it was, he, in common with his neighbors, deemed the insurrection simply one of those little outbreaks that occur every now and again in Mexico, and which hitherto had been promptly squashed by Diaz's army.

And so, with no real misgivings, the party had bidden the bluff, good-natured rancher good-by, little dreaming under what circ.u.mstances they were to meet again.

But all this time we have been allowing our party to travel on without bestowing any attention upon them. As the afternoon wore on, Coyote Pete began to feel real apprehension about reaching their destination that evening. Walt Phelps' fear about the water had been verified.

The supply was getting low. Provided they could "pick up" the mesa they were in search of before sundown, however, this was not so serious a matter as might have been supposed. Coyote Peter knew that there was a well at the mesa, the handiwork of the ancient desert-dwellers.

The really serious thing was, that although they had apparently been traveling in the right direction, they had not yet sighted it. The cow-puncher knew, though he did not tell his young companions so, that they should long since have spied its outlines. Of the real seriousness which their position might shortly a.s.sume, the boys had as yet, little idea. Coyote Pete was not the one to alarm them unless he was convinced it was really necessary.

Suddenly, Jack, who had been riding a little in advance of the rest, gave an exclamation and pointed upward at the sun.

"Say, what's the matter with the sun?" he exclaimed.

"Sun spots, I suppose," put in Ralph Stetson jokingly.

"I see what you mean," spoke up the professor; "it has turned quite red, and there seems to be a haze overcasting the sky."

"It's getting oppressive, too," put in Walt Phelps. "What's up, Pete?"

The cow-puncher had, indeed, for some time been noticing the same phenomenon which had just attracted their notice, but he had hesitated to draw their attention to it. Now, however, he spoke, and his voice sounded grave for one of Pete's usually lively temperament.

"It means that ole Mar'm Desert is gettin' inter a tantrum," he grunted, "and that we're in an almighty fix," he added to himself.

"Is it going to rain?" inquired Ralph Stetson, as it grew rapidly darker.

"Rain?" grunted Pete. "Son, it don't rain here enough to cover the back uv a dime, even if you collect all the water that fell in a year.

No, siree, what's comin' is a heap worse than rain."

"An electric storm?" queried the professor.

"No, sir--a sand storm," rejoined the cow-puncher bluntly.