Essential Western Novels - Volume 4. Max Brand

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      "In the office," replied Dora. "Come with me, and I'll show you where it is."

      As the two returned to the ranch house, Bert Adams rode into the yard and up to the corral. He was swaying in the saddle when his horse came to a stop. Painfully and laboriously, he dismounted; then he lay down in the dirt, while his horse walked on into the stable.

      Bruce Marvel was sitting in the office of the hotel in the little cow town when the telephone bell rang. The proprietor was washing his face in a tin basin just outside the door. His hands and his hair and his eyes and his nose and his mouth were covered with lather. "Will you answer the danged thing for me, young feller?" he asked; and in compliance with the request Bruce crossed to the instrument.

      "Hello!" he said, as he took down the receiver.

      "Hello!" said a voice at the other end. "This is John White at the TF Ranch. I want to speak to the deputy sheriff."

      "Wait a minute," said Bruce, and then turning to the proprietor "Here's a fellow wants to talk with the deputy sheriff," he said.

      "He's out to his ranch, and he aint got no telephone. Take the message."

      "I can't get hold of him now," said Marvel into the transmitter, "but if you'll give me your message I'll get it to him."

      "My daughter and Cory Blaine are lost somewhere in the hills," said White. "They went out on a paper chase early this morning. Every one else is in but them. Blaine's horse came in alone five minutes ago. I want the sheriff to form a posse and make a thorough search for them. I'll stand all the expenses and pay a reward in addition."

      Marvel was almost stunned by the information, but his voice showed no indication of excitement as he answered. "One man will start right now, Mr. White," he said, "and the sheriff will be notified to follow with a posse. Good bye," and he hung up without waiting to hear more.

      In a few brief words he explained the situation to the hotel proprietor. "Can you get word to the sheriff at once?" he asked.

      "I'll have a man on the road in five minutes."

      "Good. And now listen to me. Tell 'em never to mind huntin' the hills. Ride straight to Hi Bryam's shack at the head of Mill Creek canyon. If they don't find nuthin' there, tell 'em to keep on along the One Mile Creek trail to Kelly's place in Sonora."

      "You seem to know a lot about this here country for a tenderfoot," commented the proprietor.

      "Never mind what I know. Get busy," and, turning, he took the steps two at a time to his room on the second floor.

      Quickly he stripped off his clothes, and opening his trunk dragged out well worn boots and spurs, overalls, flannel shirt, Stetson, chaps and bandana. Quickly he donned them, and then strapped about his hips a cartridge belt that supported two old forty-fours in holsters as darkened and mellowed by age as were his chaps and his cartridge belt.

      As he ran down the stairs, crossed the office and stepped out into the night, no one saw him, for the proprietor had gone to find a man to send after the sheriff. The train from the east was pulling into the station; and Butts was waiting for his passengers; so that he did not see Marvel as the latter hurried to the stable as Olga Gunderstrom alighted from the train.

      No one was at the livery stable as Marvel entered and saddled and bridled Baldy, for the proprietor was eating his supper in his home across the street.

      Earlier in the afternoon, while it was still light, Marvel had noticed a pile of empty gunny sacks on the floor beside the grain bin. Into one of these he dumped several measures of oats, tied the sack securely back of his saddle and a moment later rode out into the night toward the south.

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      XV

      ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS

      BUTTS' none too lovely disposition had been badly strained by his enforced wait for the delayed train. There were urgent reasons why he should have been back at the ranch early; and now as he wrestled with two trunks and three suit cases in an endeavor to strap them all securely to the back of the buckboard, he inwardly cursed everything and everybody that came out of the East, and especially the supercilious young woman who spoke to him in the same tone of voice as she had addressed the colored porter as she tipped him at the Pullman steps. But at last he had everything tied on securely; and then he turned to the girl, "Get in, Miss," he said brusquely; and when she had seated herself beside him "You better hang on tight. We're goin' to travel."

      Once across the railroad tracks he gave the broncos a cut with the whip; and as they bounded forward, Olga Gunderstrom's head snapped back.

      "Mercy!" she exclaimed. "Please be more careful, my man."

      Butts gritted his teeth and struck the horses again.

      "I shall report you for this," snapped the young lady.

      "Report and be blowed," snapped Butts. "I'm sick of this job anyway. I'm fed up on dudes and dudesses."

      A short distance out of town they passed a lone horseman who spurred his horse to one side of the road as they dashed past. Out of the corner of his eye Butts saw the rider; but so quickly did he pass that he recognized nothing familiar in the figure, which is not surprising, though had he been able to note the horse more closely he would doubtless have found much that was familiar about him.

      It was a dusty and angry young woman who alighted from the buckboard at the foot of the TF Ranch house steps. Dora Crowell recognized her immediately and ran down to greet her.

      "Why, Olga Gunderstrom!" she cried. "Cory Blaine never told me you were coming today."

      "Well, here I am," snapped Olga; "and it's no fault of this man here that I am here alive. I never saw such a surly, impudent person in my life. Where is Mr. Blaine? He ought to discharge him at once."

      "Mr. Blaine is missing," said Dora. "We are afraid that something has happened to him and Miss White in the hills. Did you hear what I said, Butts?"

      "Yes, I heard you, Miss," replied the man, who received the news without any show of excitement.

      "Bud and the other two boys have gone out to search for them," continued Dora. "Don't you think you better go too, Butts?"

      "That's what I'm aimin' on doin'," replied the man. "If there was anything here but dudes I could get started right away, but I've got to unload all this junk and then put the team away."

      "We'll attend to that," said John White. "I'll certainly be glad to have another man who knows the hills out looking for them."

      As he came down the steps toward the buckboard, Benson Talbot arose. "I'll help you, Mr. White," he said.

      "I'd like to," murmured Bert Adams weakly, "but I don't think I can get up."

      "We can manage it all right, I guess," said White.

      "Thanks!" mumbled Butts ungraciously, as he started for the corral.

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