Comrades of the Saddle Part 7

CHAPTER VI

IN THE SADDLE

"How far away are those mountains?" asked Tom, gazing in their direction as they walked to the corral the next day.

"About forty miles," replied Bill. "They are called the 'Lost Lode' hills, because there is said to be a rich silver mine in them somewhere that the Spaniards worked hundreds of years ago. Just where it is, though, no one has ever been able to discover."

"Wouldn't it be great if we could find it?" exclaimed Larry eagerly. "Do you suppose your father would let us go and try?

Have you ever been over to the hills?"

"Lots of times on hunting trips. But we never explored them very much. The trouble is no one knows whether the mine is on this side or the other."

"But haven't they searched for it?" queried Tom, to whose mind a silver mine suggested unlimited wealth.

"Lots of men have tried, but no one who has gone to find it has ever been seen again," returned Bill. "They say the mine is haunted by the ghosts of the old Spaniards who discovered it and that they kill any one who goes near it."

At the suggestion of phantom Spaniards guarding the mine and despatching those who found it the brothers laughed.

"You surely don't believe in ghosts?" inquired Tom, a tone of scorn in his voice. "Who started the story about the ghosts, anyhow?"

"I don't know," responded the elder of the Wilder boys, rather disappointed that the legend did not make more of an impression on his friends. "We heard it when we came here. The cowboys all believe it, and nothing would make them pa.s.s a night in those hills if they could help it."

But ghosts were something in which the two brothers had been taught not to believe, and Tom exclaimed:

"Huh! I'll bet some one has found the mine and started these stories to keep other people from going there. Maybe there are three or four mines," he added as his lively imagination began to work.

"It's all right for you to laugh; you haven't been in the hills,"

snapped Horace. "If you'd heard Cross-eyed Pete tell about the night he was camping there and was scared away by hearing men shooting you might think differently."

"Just the same, I'd be willing to go and hunt for it," persisted Tom.

"And so would I," chimed in his brother. "I say," he continued, "why can't we go on a hunting trip? We needn't say anything about trying to find the mine. Then, if we didn't, no one could laugh at us and say we got scared."

The refusal of the boys from Ohio to believe in the haunted mine had at first nettled Bill and Horace, but they had always been keen to hear or see phantoms, and at Larry's proposal of the hunting trip they became enthusiastic.

"It will be great sport, if father will let us," a.s.sented Horace.

"Come on, we'll ask him."

And abandoning their intention of roping ponies, they turned back to the house in search of Mr. Wilder.

Finding him on the piazza, they lost no time in laying their plan for a hunting trip before him.

As he beheld the eager faces and noted the lithe, supple bodies of the boys, in whose eyes shone the light of fearlessness, the ranchman replied:

"I have no objection, if you don't go beyond the foothills. Bill, you remember the trails I showed you last spring, don't you?"

"Yes, sir."

"All right, keep to them. You boys certainly ought to be able to take care of yourselves. Go and tell Hop Joy to put up some grub for you. You had better camp on the plains to-night, so you won't be able to shoot your food."

Delighted at the thought of going on a hunting trip, the boys hurried away to the Chinaman.

"Golly! You boyee go shootee?" exclaimed the celestial when he had received the orders to pack their food. "No flaid ghostee?"

"Of course not," replied Horace. "There's no such thing as ghosts, Hop Joy."

"Mebbe so, mebbe not; no be too sure," grunted the Chinaman.

"Plete, him say they be."

But the boys did not linger to argue the matter, and only waiting to see that Hop Joy put in a quant.i.ty of doughnuts, went to get their rifles and sh.e.l.ls ready.

To their surprise, when they returned to the piazza, they found the ranchman busily overhauling his guns.

"I reckon I'll go with you," he explained. "I haven't been hunting for some time, and as everything is quiet I can get away for three or four days as well as not."

"Oh, good! Hooray!" exclaimed the boys.

And Horace added: "Now we won't have to worry about getting lost."

Not long did it take the lads to clean their rifles and fill their cartridge belt with sh.e.l.ls.

"Have you two got any knives?" inquired Mr. Wilder, looking at Tom and Larry.

"Sure," replied Larry, and he told of the old gold miner's presents and his advice about always carrying the pieces of thong with them.

"Silas is no fool," smiled the ranchman. "If you remember all he told you, you won't get into trouble. Still, I think it would be just as well for you to let me put your money in my safe. Then you surely can't lose it."

"That's what father told us to do," said Larry as he and Tom removed their buckskin money bags and gave them to the ranchman.

"We forgot it, though."

"Speaking about forgetting, what about the German boy?" asked Mrs.

Wilder, who had come to learn the cause of the preparations.

At the mention of Hans the four lads looked at one another in dismay. But the ranchman came to the rescue, saying:

"From all Larry and Tom say, I don't reckon he'll be keen on hunting. You can let him help Ned."

"Ned's our handy man," explained Horace in a whisper. "He drives the grub wagon to Tolopah, and to the boys in their camps."

"Well, here comes the wagon now," observed Mrs. Wilder as she caught sight of the big white-covered wagon, called a prairie schooner in the old days, bobbing over the plains about a mile away.

"Oh, don't let's wait," protested Horace. "We can saddle up and go and meet them. I'll make my pony dance and perhaps that will scare Hans so he won't care to go."

"All right," laughed Mr. Wilder. "Bring up the ponies. Get Buster for me."

Running to the wagon shed, the boys gathered the saddles, bridles, some oats and pans and started for the corral.