Chapter X: The Locoed Buffalo

The loud talking of the two boys and the flight of the flock of scavengers--of all but that lone captive--soon attracted the attention of the other members of the party.

Mr. Wallace gaped in wonder and annoyance at seeing his son being dragged along, frantically clutching at every object in sight, in the hope of anchoring, and thus staying, his progress. Jerry Brime stared, hardly believing his eyes at witnessing such a curious happening. But Zander Forbes, who had been made Lanky's confidant in the matter, stopped laughing and jumped toward the spot where his rifle lay, the gravity of the situation coming to him like a sudden blow.

Lanky had fortunately succeeded in laying hold of what looked like a sturdy tuft of wiry buffalo grass, and to this he was clinging with might and main. At the same time with his other hand he was stretching down, trying to release his leg from the binding coil of rope.

As long as the strong wings of the frightened and now angry vulture continued to beat the air so wildly, this was rendered utterly out of the question; for the rope was kept taut, and all Lanky's desperate efforts to unfasten it failed.

"The bird's got tired of trying to yank him up into the air, Frank!" called out Paul. "See, he's dropped back to the ground again, and, as sure as you live, he's hopping straight at Lanky as if he meant to give him a licking for his meanness! Wow! I'm glad it isn't me out there."

"Lanky doesn't seem able to get clear of that loop of the rope!" snapped Frank, "and unless something happens to prevent it he's going to be in danger of having that terrible bird pecking at his eyes!"

"What can we do, Frank, to stop that?" gasped the aroused and now alarmed Paul.

"Let's run, and shout to try and scare the bird off!" suggested the other loyal chum of the reckless Lanky.

"Wait! There's Zander with his gun, Frank. I guess he's got the number of that bird's mess, all right."

Paul had hardly spoken when there came the sharp report of a rifle. Frank, to his great joy, saw the angry vulture fall over and kick as though its finish had indeed come with the pressure of Zander's fore-finger on the trigger.

"Bully! Bully!" shouted the relieved Paul. "He cooked that old fighter's goose for him all right! Now Lanky's managed to get his leg free, and is coming back to camp, carrying the rope and the antelope hide. His little game worked all to the good, but took a turn he didn't count on. See him limp, will you? That left leg feels sore, I bet you!"

"I reckon it serves him about right, as his dad will tell him," observed Frank. "Of all the fool tricks I've ever known that boy to try out, this wanting to lasso a live vulture takes the cake! Most people wouldn't want to touch the horrible things with a ten-foot pole."

Lanky looked foolish as he reached the place where Jerry had a little cooking fire burning, although he grinned, and tried to pass the whole thing off as a mere incident.

His father said nothing to him just then. But Frank and Paul knew that in the end Mr. Wallace would have a confidential talk with his son, in which Lanky would "eat humble pie," admitting that his had been a silly scheme that gave him only what he deserved.

Jerry managed to broil enough of the antelope meat for all, even though the three boys did come back repeatedly for further portions, things tasted so good to them.

Mr. Wallace understood, for he had eaten in the open many times himself.

"Food always does taste different when the surroundings are Nature's," he said, as they still sat around and "stoked up," as Lanky termed it.

"It does to me, for one," admitted Frank. "Chances are that if we had this spread at home, with a white tablecloth and china to serve it on, none of us would care a great deal for this venison. It might seem tough and dry unless cooked with bacon slices between. But out here, with appetites like woodchoppers in the cold North, it's a whole lot different."

Lanky was unusually quiet that evening, Frank noticed. Undoubtedly he realized that sometimes what are meant to be pranks turn out to border perilously close to tragedies.

When morning came the boys noticed that no haste was made to get started, and presently the reason for this was made known.

"Would you believe it," said Frank, coming over to where the other two boys were sitting after breakfast was over, "that miserable pack pony has wandered off during the night. It's going to bother us a heap, I reckon."

"Do you mean we'll be held up here in this little valley while a hunt is made for the pony?" demanded Lanky, looking anything but pleased over the possibility of further delay.

"All of us are to start out and search," admitted Frank. "Your father's given us the job of combing the valley to the north, while the others head south. We are to get back to camp by noon, and if the beast hasn't been found by that time we'll have to divide the stores among the bunch, for your dad says he can't be delayed any longer."

"I know what he's thinking about," said Lanky. "He's expecting a mighty important letter from New York that means a whole lot to him in the way of money. It may not arrive before we get back to Rockspur; but if it does I heard him telling Lige to send along one of the other boys to find us at Gold Fork."

According to the plan resolved on, the three boys left camp, going to the north in search of the pack pony, just as Zander and Jerry started toward the south.

"It'll be a nice little gallop for us, anyway," said Frank, who always looked at the bright side of things.

Paul, however, shrugged his shoulders and he called out:

"I'm not quite so keen about a side gallop as you fellows. Fact is, I'm getting pretty well filled up on pony riding. Three days straight is going some for a greenhorn like me. But I'm game to stick it out to a finish. Only I do hope we run across that Wandering Willie of a pony inside of an hour or two, so as to strike back to camp again."

For some time the boys rode along, keeping a lookout on every side. It kept growing warmer all the while, for the mountains shut off any breeze from the west, while a ridge called foothills did the same in the opposite quarter.

An hour passed, and not a single glimpse did the boys get of the missing pack pony.

"Looks as if he had gone south instead of this way," commented Frank. "Though it's possible the beast had intelligence enough to head over the rise and start back home."

"Homesick, you mean, Frank?" laughed Paul.

"Some horses are affected that way, I'm told."

Lanky was unusually quiet all this while. Frank wondered whether the ludicrous adventure with the lassoed vulture had given him a lesson in prudence he would not soon forget.

He looked toward the towering peaks to the immediate west, as though aggrieved because things had happened in such a fashion as to prevent their ascent of those rugged slopes by way of the friendly canyon.

That was what Frank was thinking, but after all it appeared that he did Lanky an injustice, for presently the other broke his silence to say:

"Once or twice last evening, just before dark set in, boys, I had a sort of hunch I could faintly glimpse smoke rising up on the side of the mountains."

"But you didn't mention a word about it to us, Lanky!" Frank put it to him reproachfully.

"I didn't, for a fact," admitted the lad. "To tell the truth, I was feeling kind of punk over the fool game I set out to pull off, and so I just concluded to keep mum and not jump out of the frying pan into the fire. But the more I think about it, the stronger is my belief that it was an occasional wreath of blue smoke I glimpsed."

"That would mean a campfire," said Frank. "And of course you feel dead certain you could say who'd be sitting near that same blaze, having supper?"

"Just what I could!" Lanky chuckled. "For one, Nash Yesson. Then, close by, you'd see a slinking sort of chap known in Columbia as a bully, and chock full of meanness. Lef Seller, who robbed his own father. Yes, and just as like as not you'd set eyes on a queer little runt with a head three sizes too big for his body, name unknown to us, but particularly fond of trying to find hidden things on moonlight nights."

"Well, I agree with you, Lanky," admitted Frank. "If there was a fire, those were the three chaps who'd be sitting beside it and talking about their chances for finding Kinney's secret cave where the gold nuggets were cached."

"Frank," said Paul just then, "did you hear what Zander was saying about the report brought to Rockspur one day last week?"

"What was that?"

"That Buffalo Smith's herd of bison had broken from their range and gone back to the free life of their kind. They skedaddled in a night."

"Yes, I heard about that," came the reply. "And Zander told me as his own private opinion that Captain Smith would have trouble rounding up the run-aways, because they'd separated in every direction, each seeming to want to look out for himself."

"Wasn't that a queer way for buffaloes to act?" queried Lanky. "I always understood they kept together in a bunch, just as our cattle do unless they've been stampeded and badly frightened, when they go into a panic."

"Zander, who seems to know lots about the animals, told me," commented Frank, "that you never can tell what a buffalo will do. He says they often seem to get wild and crazy, as if they'd been eating the loco weed that's found sometimes on the plains. But what made you bring up that subject, if it's a fair question, Paul?"

"Oh, just because we're pretty close to one of that same run-away herd right now," came the cool and astonishing reply.

"What's that?" exclaimed Lanky, perking up instantly.

"Where do you see a buffalo?" asked Frank, also interested, although believing the other must have deceived himself.

Paul pulled in his pony and pointed toward the foot of the mountain chain.

"Right alongside that patch of trees growing in front of the big boulder. There, he's raised his shaggy head and is staring straight at us!"

The others took one good look, and then while Lanky whistled to mark his surprise, also delight, Frank hastened to give his opinion.

"Good eyes you've certainly got, Paul, for I looked that way myself, and if I noticed anything at all I must have believed that object was only a shadow. But it's as plain as print to me now. That's a buffalo bull--his bulk tells us that."

"Shall we ride over and take a squint at the beast?" asked Lanky.

"For one," Paul told him, "I'd like to say I'd seen a genuine wild buffalo on his native ground, and me astride a cow pony."

"Let's go!" was Frank's terse way of saying he found himself of the same mind as the others. No one had to ask Lanky what he wanted to do, since he invariably proved ready for action of any kind.

Accordingly they turned to the left and cantered forward. Already did the cow ponies scent the presence of the lumbering beast near by. This was made evident by the way in which they snorted and took brisk, chopping steps, indicating their extreme excitement.

"They're not used to coming so close to buffaloes," explained Frank. "Fact is, I hardly think any one of the three has ever before glimpsed such a sight as this."

"But their noses have caught the wild animal scent, you can see," Lanky ventured, he being much at home in the doings of four-footed creatures.

"Why doesn't the silly thing start running off?" cried Paul. "I thought they were always reckoned a timid bunch in spite of their bulk and savage-looking mop of hair about their heads."

"Slow up, fellows!" called out Frank just then.

"Why, what's the matter?" demanded Paul, turning toward Frank.

Lanky kept going on, as if to say:

"Shucks! who's afraid of a lonely lost buffalo? Not me!"

"I don't quite like the way old Boss acts," continued Frank. "See him shake his head and lower his ugly black horns. You've both seen a bull in the pasture do that many a time, boys, when he was getting primed for a charge."

"Yes; and I don't like the looks of it!" asserted Paul emphatically.

"Say, do you think he's got the same objection to my red handkerchief that a tame Jersey bull shows?" and Paul threw up his hand, ready to tear the offending fiery cowboy neck-piece loose, so he might cram it into his pocket.

"It might be that," Frank told him. "Then again, wasn't there something said about the herd of bison having made a meal off that terrible loco weed that grows in places and affects cows and sends 'em off like mad dogs?"

Even Lanky pulled up when Frank said that. His recent experience in the realm of adventure was too fresh for him to forget the humiliation that followed close on its heels; and prudence, as his father had counseled him, began to urge that from now on he go a bit slow.

The ponies seemed to understand intuitively that the buffalo was not the ordinary docile domestic beast, accustomed to the presence of man. They snorted worse than ever, acting as though eager to whirl about and leave that part of the valley as fast as four legs could carry them.

"Whoop! here he comes licketty-split!" yelled Lanky. "I've got a date somewhere else, believe me! I sure haven't lost any buffalo! Tra-la-la! Old Boss, here's giving you the grand bounce! It's not me you want!"

He let his frantic pony turn as on a pivot, and shoot away, with Frank a good second.

Paul, never a good rider, tried to do likewise. He had the ill-fortune to lose his seat, and be thrown to the ground. He looked back to see that black-horned and shaggy-headed beast charging wildly toward him!