Before he had got through with Mr. Meldrum, he had mussed his hair up considerable. Dan tried to gun him and got an awful walloping. He hit the trail to Jess Tighe's place. When Mr. Rutherford heard of it, he was annoyed. First off, because of what had happened at the depot.

Second, and a heap more important, because the jailbird had threatened Miss Beulah. So he straddled a horse and called on Dan, who shook the dust of Huerfano Park from his bronco's hoofs _poco tiempo_."

"Where has he gone?" asked Roy.

"n.o.body knows, and he won't tell. But, knowing Meldrum as we do, Rutherford and I have come to a coincidentical opinion, as you might say. He's a bad actor, that bird. We figure that he's waiting in the chaparral somewhere to pull off a revenge play, after which he means _p.r.o.nto_ to slide his freight across the line to the land of old Porf.

Diaz."

"Revenge--on Jeff Rutherford--or who?"

"Son, that's a question. But Jeff won't be easily reached. On the whole, we think you're elected."

Roy's heart sank. If Meldrum had been kicked out of Huerfano Park, there was no room for him in New Mexico. Probably the fear of the Rutherfords had been a restraint upon him up to this time. But now that he had broken with them and was leaving the country, the man was free to follow the advice of Tighe. He was a bully whose prestige was tottering. It was almost sure that he would attempt some savage act of reprisal before he left. Beaudry had no doubt that he would be the victim of it.

"What am I to do, then?" he wanted to know, his voice quavering.

"Stay right here at the ranch. Don't travel from the house till we check up on Meldrum. Soon as he shows his hand, we'll jump him and run him out of the country. All you've got to do is to sit tight till we locate him."

"I'll not leave the house," Roy vowed fervently.

Chapter XXI

Roy Rides his Paint Hoss

But he did.

For next day Pat Ryan rode up to the Lazy Double D with a piece of news that took Roy straight to his pinto. Beulah Rutherford had disappeared. She had been out riding and Blacky had come home with an empty saddle. So far as was known, Brad Charlton had seen her last.

He had met her just above the Laguna Sinks, had talked with her, and had left the young woman headed toward the mountains.

The word had reached Battle b.u.t.te through Slim Sanders, who had been sent down from Huerfano Park for help. The Rutherfords and their friends were already combing the hills for the lost girl, but the owner of the horse ranch wanted Sheriff Sweeney to send out posses as a border patrol. Opinion was divided. Some thought Beulah might have met a grizzly, been unhorsed, and fallen a victim to it. There was the possibility that she might have stumbled while climbing and hurt herself. According to Sanders, her father held to another view. He was convinced that Meldrum was at the bottom of the thing.

This was Roy's instant thought, too. He could not escape the sinister suggestion that through the girl the ruffian had punished them all.

While he gave sharp, short orders to get together the riders of the ranch, his mind was busy with the situation. Had he better join Sweeney's posse and patrol the desert? Or would he help more by pushing straight into the hills?

Dingwell rode up and looked around in surprise. "What's the stir, son?"

His partner told him what he had heard and what he suspected.

Before he answered, Dave chewed a meditative cud. "Maybeso you're right--and maybe 'way off. Say you're wrong. Say Meldrum has nothing to do with this. In that case it is in the hills that we have got to find Miss Beulah."

"But he has. I feel sure he has. Mr. Ryan says Rutherford thinks so, too."

"Both you and Hal have got that crook Meldrum in yore minds. You've been thinking a lot about him, so you jump to the conclusion that what you're afraid of has happened. The chances are ten to one against it.

But we'll say you're right. Put yourself in Meldrum's place. What would he do?"

Beaudry turned a gray, agonized face on his friend. "I don't know.

What--what would he do?"

"The way to get at it is to figure yourself in his boots. Remember that you're a bad, rotten lot, cur to the bone. You meet up with this girl and get her in yore power. You've got a grudge against her because she spoiled yore plans, and because through her you were handed the whaling of yore life and are being hounded out of the country.

You're sore clear through at all her people and at all her friends.

Naturally, you're as sweet-tempered as a sore-headed bear, and you've probably been drinking like a sheepherder on a spree."

"I know what a devil he is. The question is how far would he dare go?"

"You've put yore finger right on the point, son. What might restrain him wouldn't be any moral sense, but fear. He knows that once he touched Miss Rutherford, this country would treat him like a rattlesnake. He could not even be sure that the Rutherfords would not hunt him down in Mexico."

"You think he would let her alone, then?"

The old-timer shook his head. "No, he wouldn't do that. But I reckon he'd try to postpone a decision as long as he could. Unless he destroyed her in the first rush of rage, he wouldn't have the nerve to do it until he had made himself crazy drunk. It all depends on circ.u.mstances, but my judgment is--if he had a chance and if he didn't think it too great a risk--that he would try to hold her a prisoner as a sort of hostage to gloat over."

"You mean keep her--unharmed?"

They were already in the saddle and on the road. Dave looked across at his white-faced friend.

"I'm only guessing, Roy, but that's the way I figure it," he said gently.

"You don't think he would try to take her across the desert with him to Mexico."

Ryan shook his head.

"No chance. He couldn't make it. When he leaves the hills, Miss Rutherford will stay there."

"Alive?" asked Beaudry from a dry throat.

"Don't know."

"G.o.d!"

"So that whether Miss Beulah did or did not meet Meldrum, we have to look for her up among the mountains of the Big Creek watershed,"

concluded Dingwell. "I believe we'll find her safe and sound. Chances are Meldrum isn't within forty miles of her."

They were riding toward Lonesome Park, from which they intended to work up into the hills. Just before reaching the rim of the park, they circled around a young pine lying across the trail. Roy remembered the tree. It had stood on a little knoll, strong and graceful, reaching straight toward heaven with a kind of gallant uprightness. Now its trunk was snapped, its boughs crushed, its foliage turning sere. An envious wind had brought it low. Somehow that pine reminded Beaudry poignantly of the girl they were seeking. She, too, had always stood aloof, a fine and vital personality, before the eyes of men sufficient to herself. But as the evergreen had stretched its hundred arms toward light and sunshine, so Beulah Rutherford had cried dumbly to life for some vague good she could not formulate.

Were her pride and courage abased, too? Roy would not let himself believe it. The way of youth is to deny the truth of all signposts which point to the futility of beauty and strength. It would be a kind of apostasy to admit that her sweet, lissom grace might be forever crushed and bruised.

They rode hard and steadily. Before dusk they were well up toward the divide among the wooded pockets of the hills. From one of these a man came to meet them.

"It's Hal Rutherford," announced Ryan, who was riding in front with Dingwell.

The owner of the horse ranch nodded a greeting as he drew up in front of them. He was unshaven and gaunt. Furrows of anxiety lined his face.

"Anything new, Hal?" asked Dave.

"Not a thing. We're combing the hills thorough."

"You don't reckon that maybe a cougar--?" Ryan stopped. It occurred to him that his suggestion was not a very cheerful one.