"And n.o.body came into camp while I was sentry," added Snake.

"That goes for me, too!" came from Yellin' Kid.

"Then we'll all have to plead guilty," chuckled Billee. "Anyhow here's the warnin' and it looks as if this fellow, whoever he is, was follerin' us up to discourage us from going on."

"Well, he shan't discourage me!" exclaimed Bud.

"Nor me!" came in a duet from Nort and d.i.c.k.

"That's the ticket! Then we'll go on!" said Billee. "But I would like to know," he murmured, "how this chap can sneak in and out of a camp without rousing somebody. I sure would!"

However there was nothing more to be done. And after making sure no clews could be picked up, the second warning was placed with the first, in Billee's big leather wallet, and the travelers prepared to resume the trail.

They were now in a wilder and more lonesome country than any they had ever before visited. It was distinctly the "bad lands," but often in such a region can be found isolated places where abundant water and herbage offer ideal sites for cattle raising.

Such, Mr. Merkel had said, was his new Dot and Dash ranch. And it was apparent to the boys and their older companions, as they rode along, that the valley was a good locality for raising cattle.

"This must be the place," said Bud as they began riding down the opposite side of the slope they had climbed to cross the low range of mountains. "It's just as dad described it. I'll show these papers to whoever's in charge and they'll know we have come to take over the ranch." He tapped in his pocket a bundle of doc.u.ments which his father had given him to show the transfer of authority.

"Yes, that's Dot and Dash," said Billee as he recalled some of the familiar landmarks. "This is the place where I used to punch cattle."

"Seems to be a right nice sort of a place," murmured Snake. "And I reckon them tales about all the cattle droppin' dead are fakes. Look at that herd," and he pointed to a collection of dots on a distant hill.

"n.o.body said _all_ the cows died!" retorted Billee. "And maybe the bad spell, whatever it was, has worked itself out. I hope so. But there's Dot and Dash all right," and he waved to a collection of ranch buildings that came into view with a turn of the trail.

In a short time they had traversed the slope and were on the level and green floor of a pleasant valley, long and narrow, yet wide enough to give s.p.a.ce to several big ranches. The hills were barren and rugged in some places, and wooded in others.

On up to the ranch rode the cavalcade, the thoughts of the boys busy with many things. It was rather a tamer entry than they had counted on after Billee's stories and the receipt of the two dramatic warnings.

"Guess we aren't going to have any trouble after all," said d.i.c.k as they rode their horses to the hitching rail, made the reins fast and dismounted to enter the main house.

"It's quiet enough," said Nort

"'Tis, for a fact," echoed Bud. "Doesn't seem to be anybody around here for me to serve my possession papers on!" he chuckled. "h.e.l.lo!

Anybody home?" he called loudly.

There was no answer save the echoes of his voice through the rambling building.

"Give 'em a call, Kid, you can make yourself heard," suggested Snake, and the yeller let out a ringing shout.

Still there was no reply and the silence was beginning to get on the nerves of the boys when Billee, who had been roaming around, came in with a queer look on his face.

"What's the matter?" asked Bud.

"There's a dead man outside in the yard," was the quiet answer of the veteran puncher.

CHAPTER VII

SAM TARBELL'S STORY

This news, so startling, coming as it did after the strange silence that seemed to wrap Dot and Dash in a pall, and following the talk that had been going on the last few days concerning the sinister aspect of the situation, was enough to startle any one. And the boy ranchers were no exception.

"A dead man?" gasped Bud.

"Who is he?" Nort wanted to know.

"Who killed him?" was d.i.c.k's question.

To these inquiries Old Billee Dobb returned no answer. As for Yellin'

Kid and Snake Purdee, they just stood in the middle of the deserted living room of the ranch house and stared at the old puncher. Death did not frighten, nor was it anything new to the cowboys. Yet Billee's news was startling.

"Let's go have a look at him," suggested Yellin' Kid, in no whit lowering his voice as he might reasonably be expected to do under the circ.u.mstances. "Where is he? Do you know him, Billee?"

"Never saw him this side of sole leather as far as I know," answered the veteran. "But he's out there by the corral, and here's another thing. If we're going to turn our ponies loose into that same corral the fence has got to be mended. 'Twon't hold a yearling as it is now."

"That can be 'tended to later," remarked Snake. "Let's go have a look at this poor gazaboo you say has cashed in."

"It looks as if Death Valley was living up to its name," said Nort to Bud as he and the other lads followed the men out of the silent and deserted house.

"Can't tell yet," was Bud's rejoinder. "This may be just a natural death, and somebody that has no connection with this ranch. Lots of pa.s.sing strangers stop at our place and he may have stopped here."

"Well, even then, that doesn't say what killed him," protested Nort.

"We'll soon find out," went on Bud. "Come on."

Billee Dobb was leading the way toward his startling discovery, and a moment later the whole outfit from Diamond X came upon the body. It lay, as Billee had said, near a corral the fence of which was much in need of repairs. The man was a typical cowboy, with a bright red neckerchief and sheepskin chaps. His gun had fallen from the holster and lay beside him. His horse was nowhere to be seen, and a cowboy without a pony between his legs, or at least in his immediate vicinity, is like Hamlet with the melancholy Dane left out.

"There he is," said Billee in a low voice.

Snake and Yellin' Kid stopped in their tracks. But Bud, who, perhaps, was too young to feel any squeamishness at the proximity to death, hurried forward and knelt beside the motionless figure. Seeing what their chum had done, Nort and d.i.c.k started to follow. But they were halted, when they had almost reached the man, by Bud's voice exclaiming:

"He isn't dead at all! He's breathing!"

"He is?" cried Nort.

"Sure! He isn't dead at all! Get me some water. We ought to have a doctor, but maybe we can pull him around until we can find one. But get some water--_p.r.o.nto_!"

d.i.c.k slung his canteen around, pulled out the stopper and, an instant later, was kneeling beside Bud and the stranger. Nort helped Bud, on the opposite side, support the man's head, which appeared to be but loosely attached to his body and the boys finally succeeded in forcing a little water between the almost lifeless lips.

"We ought to have some sort of a stimulant," said Bud as he noticed a faint flickering of the man's eyelids, as though life was struggling hard to return to the frame it had almost decided to vacate.

"I got some aromatic ammonia in my saddle bags," said d.i.c.k. "Your mother put it in with a lot of other medicine, thinking we might need it."

"We do, now, and mighty bad!" exclaimed Bud. "Rustle it here, d.i.c.k."