The Ranch Girls' Pot of Gold Page 5

  CHAPTER III

  CAUGHT IN THE TRAP

  Jean and Jack and Olive were cantering slowly through the fields aboutan hour before breakfast the next morning. The spring air was sodelicious that they had not been able to resist it. Jack had wakedbefore dawn and had kept quite still to listen to the silvery song ofthe wood thrush outside her bedroom window; she had not wished to go tosleep again, for her mind was too busy with Jean's plan for their summerholiday. When daylight came Jean was aroused by the noise of Jack'smovements in the room, and opened her eyes to find her cousin slippinginto her riding clothes. She too was eager for a ride, and when theysoftly called to Olive to join them the three girls stole out together.

  "Jack, you will have to broach the subject of our caravan trip to Jimto-day; I am sure you will be all powerful," Jean suggested, as soon asthey were fairly on their way. "The more I am out of doors the more Ithink of how utterly rapturous it will be to spend our summer intraveling around and camping wherever we like. Tell Olive and mesomething about the people who want to rent our ranch, Jack," Jean endedcuriously.

  Jack shook her head slowly. "I am afraid I don't know very much aboutthem, Jean," she answered. "Mr. and Mrs. Harmon are New York people; heis a stock broker and they are friends of Mrs. Post's and Laura's. AuntSallie does not know them personally, but she says they have one son anda daughter. The daughter is lame and an invalid; I believe they want tobring her out west to see what the climate will do for her." Jack gavean unconscious shudder of horror and sympathy and touched her ponylightly with her whip. The girls were galloping over a part of the ranchthat was carpeted with wild prairie roses.

  "Where are we going, Jack?" Olive queried, riding close beside her.

  "If you and Jean don't mind, Olive, we are going over on the other sideof Rainbow Creek," Jack replied apologetically. "Jim and one of the menset a trap over there yesterday to catch some animal that has beenworrying our sheep. You know I don't mind when the poor thieves arekilled outright for their bad behavior, but sometimes they catch theirlegs in the traps and nearly pull them off." Jack flushed, but neitherJean nor Olive smiled at her; they knew that she was like a boy in manyways and was too good a sportsman to want anything to sufferunnecessarily.

  The girls crossed the creek at a spot where the water was lowest; thespring rains had fallen and it was quite deep in many places. They rodein silence along the familiar path that followed the creek bed, each, inher own way, yielding her senses to the influence of the enchantmentthat the rare summer morning had created.

  Click! click! A curious noise came from somewhere farther down the bedof the creek; it seemed to sound from behind a huge rock that rose upalongside the stream and split into a small ravine. Click! click! Thesound was repeated.

  Jack reined in her pony so suddenly that Jean almost ran into her. "Whatwas that?" Jack asked quickly, but Jean put her finger cautiously to herlips and signaled for silence.

  Click! click! click! The echo was louder and more puzzling, and Jackslid softly off her horse, threw the reins to Olive and crept along thepath until she came to the far side of the great rock. The noise wasmore distinct, but still she could see nothing; then she clambered upthe rock and peered over. A man stood with a little hammer in his hand,chipping out small pieces of stone; a big pan filled with sand andgravel and water from Rainbow Creek was resting on the ground by hisside.

  A little murmur of surprise escaped Jack, and the intruder glanced up ather; he had been so intent on his work and so sure of not beingdiscovered at that hour of the morning that he had not been disturbed byJack's approach.

  "So it is you, is it?" he said calmly. "I hope you don't mind my havinga few pieces of these rocks as a souvenir of my visit to your ranch. Iknow you and your overseer objected to my prospecting for gold abouthere. That is the reason I pretended to drive away last night."

  Jack at once recognized the speaker as the driver of the gypsy caravanof the day before. "I don't see how I am going to prevent your havingthe stones and pebbles now that you have already taken possession ofthem," she answered indifferently. "But please don't let our overseerfind you lurking about, or he will be dreadfully angry."

  The stranger laughed and shrugged his shoulders carelessly, and Jacknoticed that he seemed very sure of himself. "Oh, don't you worry aboutJohn, Jim Colter I mean," he returned coolly. "I am not afraid of him,though I won't trouble you any more than I can help."

  "Did you ask the man if he found any signs of gold in our creek, Jack?"Jean demanded eagerly, as the three girls rode off together again.

  Jack shook her head. "No, silly, of course I didn't," she replied."There are lots of people out west who are crazy about finding gold.Don't you suppose if there had been any gold on our ranch father wouldhave made the discovery years ago?"

  "I don't know," Jean returned quietly. "But you might have asked justthe same."

  Jim had set his animal trap in some thick underbrush and covered it withtwigs and evergreens, but Jack remembered the exact spot, and the girlsnow rode directly toward it. Jack carried her rifle with her, for ifthey found an animal that had been caught and not killed she intended toput it out of its misery.

  Within a short distance of the trap, but before the girls could see it,they heard a queer moaning that made them turn pale. The cry was notlike a child's and not like an animal's; it was a queer combination ofboth.

  Jean stopped her pony instantly. "I sha'n't go on any farther with you,Jack," she declared resolutely. "Jim has caught something in thatwretched trap of his and it is suffering horribly. It won't do any goodfor me to see it. Olive, please you go on with Jack; I simply can't, Iam such a wretched coward."

  Olive and Jack both looked rather miserable at the prospect ahead ofthem, but Jack would not turn back and Olive would not desert her. Bythis time the strange sobbing had ceased and there was no further soundof movement or struggle in the neighborhood of the snare until the twogirls rode up in plain sight of it.

  "Good gracious, Olive, what is that?" Jack called quickly, almostfalling from her horse in her amazement.

  Instead of discovering a wild animal staring at them with ferocious,frightened eyes, the riders spied a small, brown figure crouched on theground in front of the wicked steel cage, as mute and motionless as ahare when first startled by a hunter. The boy's back was turned to Oliveand Jack and he would not condescend even to look around at his captors.

  Jack guessed at once what had happened. The child must have beenstarving, for he had thrust his arm inside the opening of the trap forthe bait that had been put inside, and the spring had closed on his arm.Both girls ran toward him, but Jack did not hear Olive's quickexclamation. Fortunately she knew the trick of opening the trap, for themoment the wires released their cruel hold on the boy, he faintedquietly in Olive's outstretched arms. He was about ten or twelve yearsold, incredibly thin, with coal-black hair that fell in straight linesto his shoulders, strange, dark eyes with the look of far places inthem, and a skin the color of burnished copper.

  "It is Carlos, little Carlos!" Olive exclaimed wonderingly. "Jack, don'tyou remember my telling you about the Indian boy who helped me to comehome to you when I was stolen by old Laska? I wonder how in the worldhe has managed to find us."

  Jack did not wait to answer Olive. Running at once to the creek forwater, she signaled Jean to join them, and together the girls bathed theboy's face until he returned to consciousness.

  Then Carlos calmly explained to Olive that he always had meant to findher some day. With her image ever before him and the names of theRalston girls and the Rainbow Ranch ever sounding in his ears, the ladhad remained quietly in the desert with his own people until the comingof spring. When the nomad tribe started south, Carlos had journeyed withthem until they again struck camp, then he had traveled on alone, askinghundreds of questions and covering more miles than he was able to count.Unconscious of the fact he had come at length within the limits ofRainbow Ranch, and when he most needed her, Olive, like a good angel,had appeared to
him. Yet Carlos took her coming calmly. Miracles areevery-day occurrences to the Indian. Wiser than the wisest of us, heknows that, in spite of all the explanations of science, the rising andthe setting of the sun, the life of a flower, most of the things hesees in his world, are nature's miracles. So the miracle of Olive'sdiscovery seemed to Carlos only another mysterious gift from the unknownFather.

  Scorning to have his wounded arm bandaged, the boy soon started homewardwith the girls. Jim and Frieda were waiting in front of the Lodge forthem to return to breakfast. Jim laughed and Frieda stared when theybeheld four figures on horseback instead of three.

  "Well, Jack, who is your latest find?" Jim called out cheerfully, wavinghis hand to Jack in token of peace and good fellowship.

  The horses stopped, and the Indian boy slid off from behind Olive'ssaddle and stood erect, facing Jim squarely. "I am Carlos, of the tribeof the Blackfeet," he answered proudly. "Are you the Big Chief of thisranch?"

  Jim Colter shook his head gravely, although his eyes were smiling. "No,I am Big Chief of nothing, sonnie," he replied kindly. "But you hadbetter come into the house with me; that is an uncommonly ugly wound youhave on your arm, and I've an idea you might be persuaded to eat alittle something."