Chapter XVII: A Chase

"Are you sure you saw that fellow, Juarez?" asked Jo.

"Certainly," replied the chief.

"Of course he did," said Jim. "You don't suppose that Juarez would exclaim at a shadow. I got a glimpse of him myself."

"What did he look like?" inquired Yankee Tom.

Jim's face took on a look of settled gravity as he answered:

"He was a tall dark-complected man, with a wart over his right eye, and he had a ring on his middle finger with his wife's picture engraved on it, and----"

"Oh, shut up," growled Tom, "you are just kidding."

"I didn't see anybody," put in Jeems Howell mildly. This remark was greeted with a roar of laughter.

"I bet you didn't," jeered Tom. "All you could do was to yell 'Whoa!'"

"But he didn't whoa!" said Jeems sadly, but truthfully.

"You did," remarked Jim.

"Somebody had to," explained Jeems, "so I decided it was up to me."

"You mean," said the whimsical Jo, "down to you."

"I suppose so."

"He has made his escape anyway," said Tom.

"So have our pack mules," cried Juarez, looking back up the mountain.

"Maybe they have just grazed off," said Jim anxiously.

This was serious business indeed, if their mules should take a notion to take the back trail with their grub and camp equipment. So the boys lost no time in getting back to the ridge and all thought of the stranger that they had tried to interview had left their minds for the present. When they got to the top of the ridge they found their worst fears realized. Juarez was the first to take in the situation, because his little roan was the fastest in a short dash. Juarez had urged his horse obliquely across the slope of the hill.

"They have scooted for home, boys," he yelled.

Sure enough there were the three beasts a mile down the trail and jogging steadily along with an evident intention in their mulish minds to go home and stay there. Now "home" was a hundred miles away, but that made no difference with their plans.

"We have got to head 'em down this other side," cried Jim. "It's no use following them on the trail. They have got the start on us and when they see us coming it will make them hike all the faster."

"You're right," said Juarez.

"There is no use for all this bunch going," said Jim. "Jo, you and Tom and Jeems stay here. Keep my guns, I'm traveling light." He handed over his rifle and revolver to his brother and Juarez gave his to Jeems. Then they gave the cinches to their saddles an extra tightening, especially the back cinches, then they swung swiftly into the saddles.

"Durn those mules," they cried and were off. Keeping their horses well in hand, for it promised to be a long hard race, they galloped along the ridge, keeping slightly below the summit. They were now on the opposite side of the ridge from where the trail was up which they had traveled. As the two headers-off got under way the gravel flew back from their horses' feet. At first the way was not very hard, but at the end of the first mile they came to a great field of broken rocks.

Here they had to slacken speed and find their way among great rocks, broken, and with many miniature canyons and ravines among them. Once they rode under the shadow of a great slab of quartz, some eighty feet long and twenty feet in thickness; like a long flat bridge it was.

"This is a sure interesting country," remarked Juarez.

"I wish that we had time to look around a bit," replied Jim, "but I am afraid that those pesky mules are gaining on us right here."

"We are almost out of this nest of rocks," encouraged Juarez.

This was true, but now they had ahead of them a long slope with many fallen trees, but the boys could not stop for such trifles. Away they went, leaping the trunks of trees, twisting this way and that, but never slackening speed. If it was not for their anxiety, it would have been fun for the two of them, as there was enough danger and variety to make it interesting. Jim's big gray, which he had captured in Mexico and had named Caliente, jumped with great power and with remarkable lightness, considering his size, but Juarez's roan was as quick as a cat and just as light on its feet.

"See that notch in the ridge," cried Jim, "about half a mile ahead?"

"Yes," replied Juarez.

"There's where we will cross and try to get ahead of those bucks."

"We will make them hustle back," cried Juarez, grinding his teeth.

"Sure," agreed Jim with a grin.

In a short time they had reached the notch and found it to be something more than that, as it was quite a deep cut in the back of the ridge, and continued into a narrow ravine, which was quite heavily wooded, and down which ran a pretty little stream of the clearest crystal.

"We ought to see those mules soon now," said Juarez.

"There's the trail," said Jim, "just a bit of it high up."

"I see it," replied Juarez.

"We will cut it soon now," remarked Jim, "then we will head those Missouri runaways."

But before they did that, a lively dash was before them, for suddenly they came in full view of the upper trail for a mile or more.

"There are those rascals," cried Juarez, pointing with an excited hand.

"I see them," said Jim.

"Brethren," remarked the mule in the lead, to his long-eared comrades, "here come our masters to head us off. Let us run." He wig-wagged this piece of news with his long ears and a waggle of his short tail. They understood perfectly and acted in unison. They did not trot, but started at a swift, sharp lope down the trail. It was fortunate for the packs that the boys were old mountaineers and knew how to make them secure else they would have been jostled into the ravine below.

The boys cut loose at full gallop down the ravine, utterly reckless of what might be ahead of them. They tore through the brush, crushing down every obstacle in their way, determined to head those mules or die in the attempt. They were mad through and through, and, for one, I can sympathize with them. They won the race by about twenty feet. Caliente with one last leap was in the trail.

The mules saw that they were intercepted and came to a halt, and looked at Jim and Juarez with quiet unconcern, mingled with a slight surprise at being so rudely interrupted in their little jaunt.

"You blasted, long-eared, rat-tailed beggars, get back where you belong," yelled Jim; "you hustle."

"Give me a rock, I'll help 'em," cried Juarez.

He reached from the saddle and picked up a number of fragments of broken granite, and Jim did the same. Then they began to pepper those mules with carefully aimed stones, sometimes striking their haunches and sometimes their ears, keeping them at a steady jog trot up the grade.

"Take that, Missouri!" Jim would cry, flipping a stone at the leader.

"Here's one for you, Pike County!" laughed Juarez, aiming at the second target.

So they kept it up, thus getting even for all the trouble the runaways had made them, which was considerable. After a while they reached the top of the ridge, expecting to find Jo, Tom and Jeems waiting for them. But there was no sign of them anywhere.

"What do you suppose has become of them?" inquired Juarez.

"Maybe that mysterious stranger has stolen them," suggested Jim.

"Let's see if we cannot find their tracks," said Juarez. This was done without difficulty.

"Here's a track that looks like a gorilla's," remarked Jim, inspecting the dust of the trail.

"Must be Jeems'," grinned Juarez.

"These other tootsie tracks are Tommy's and Jo's, I reckon," said Jim.

"But why did they walk instead of ride?" inquired Juarez.

"They didn't intend to go far and thought it just as easy to walk," explained Jim.

Just then there came a faint halloo that caused the boys to look up.

"There's Jeems, the beanstalk," cried Jim.

"Where?" asked Juarez.

"See that shadow standing on that rock way over yonder?" inquired Jim.

"Yes."

"That's him."

"What do you suppose that they are doing over there?" asked Juarez.

"We won't be long in finding out," replied Jim.

"There's Jeems' castle," said Juarez, after they had ridden a few hundred yards, pointing to a speck high up on the mountain side.

Juarez was right, for Jeems and the other boys soon met them with the news that they had located the cabin where they hoped to find the plan that would give them a clue to the location of the Lost Mine.

"Have a hard chase after the mules, Jim?" inquired Jo as they climbed up a steep slope towards the cabin.

"You ought to have been along," remarked Jim significantly.

"I hope Juarez don't let 'em get away this time," said Tom.

"If you must worry, why don't you take something probable," remarked Jim severely. "Like Jeems running off to become a circus rider."

"You would have thought that he was a circus rider sure enough," laughed Jo, "if you could have seen him riding down that slope this morning, with his feet stuck straight out in front of him, and yelling whoa to 'Mosquito.'"

"I thought," said Jeems sadly, "that if I held my feet that way that they would offer enough resistance to the air to stop or slow up Mosquito,--but they didn't."