The Pony Rider Boys in Montana Part 14

"Huh! What were they doing!"

"You can search me for the answer. I haven't got it," laughed the big fellow. "We don't need to bother about them. They're out here with some crazy idea in their tops. They can't interfere with our plans any."

"You'd better not be too sure about that," chuckled Tad. "Perhaps one of them may if he has the good luck to get out of here without being discovered."

"What's the plan, Bluff?"

"So that's his name? I'll remember that," muttered Tad.

"That's what I wanted you boys to meet me here for. I want you to see all the ranchers before to-morrow night on both sides of the Rosebud. Understand now, no blunt giving away of the game. You want to start by telling them you hear Boss Simms is bringing in ten thousand head of sheep, and that he's going to graze them up the valley all the way over the free gra.s.s to the north. Tell them that it'll be mighty poor picking for the cows and so on until you get 'em good and properly mad----"

"Yes, what then?"

"Better let the ranchers make threats first, then you can say that you hear the others are going to teach Boss Simms a lesson and stampede his flock to-morrow or next night. Say you hear the word will go out when the mine is ready to touch a match to. You'll know how to work it?"

"Sure thing, Bluff. Who do you want us to see?"

"I want you and Jake to take the west side of the mountains. Lazy and I will take the east. Work it thoroughly and don't you go to making any bad breaks. Right after the job is over, besides the sheep we get for our own herd, there'll be a few thousand laying dead around these parts. We'll take the contract to skin them for the hides. That'll be another rake off. Do you follow me?"

"Yes."

"To-morrow night meet me at the Three Sisters and I'll be able to give you your orders for the rest of the boys."

"You don't think they'll suspect you--that they'll be wise to what the game is?" asked one of the men apprehensively.

"No fear of that. They'd never mix me up with any such deal as that. I'm a respectable law abiding rancher, I am," laughed the man with the red beard. "Don't you go to getting cold feet. That's the sure way to get caught," admonished the leader.

"Want us to start now?"

"No, sure not. What's the use? We'd better turn in and get some sleep. It'll be light enough by three o'clock in the morning. We'll get a rasher of bacon and some hot coffee, then we'll light out for the valley. You know you don't have to see Bob Moore. And better not go near the Circle T Ranch. I'm not any too sure about those fellows. We'll turn in now."

"I've heard enough to hang the whole bunch," thought Tad Butler. "The trouble is I don't know who they are. But that does not make so much difference. Only if I did know, Mr. Simms might be able to have them arrested. As it is, I guess the best he can do is to get ready to fight them off when they do come," reasoned the lad.

"Better stake the ponies nearer camp in case anything comes along. I came across bear tracks a few miles to the east of here," the big man advised them.

"So did I," thought Tad.

"I forgot to tell you that there'll be three or four Crow braves with us on the raid as well as half a dozen Blackfeet?"

"Blackfeet? What are them redskins doing down here, off the reservation?" demanded Jake.

"They're like all critters, think the pasture over the fence is better'n their own," laughed Bluff. "Guess there's no need of any of us keeping awake. We ain't likely to have any surprises."

The cowboy outlaw, however, was about to have the most surprising of surprises that could have come to him at that time.

Tad, in his anxiety to catch every word that was uttered, had drawn his body close up to the edge of the cliff, his head and shoulders hanging well over.

In front of him, right down to the camp stretched a long, sloping rock, whose smooth face, glistened in the light of the camp fire. As the men rose to prepare for the night, Tad began pulling himself cautiously back, bracing himself with one hand.

Suddenly the hand slipped. How it happened he was unable to tell afterward, but instantly Tad was over the rock and tobogganing down its side head first.

A spot rougher than the rest of the rock, caught in his clothes, righting the boy's body, permitting him to shoot down the rest of the way, feet first.

The Pony Rider Boy's presence of mind did not desert him for an instant. It was not a long drop. He felt that he would land safely, providing he did not turn again and land on his head instead of his feet. It was a chance very liable to happen, as he knew from his experience of a second before.

They heard him coming, but did not catch the significance of it.

"What's that!" exclaimed Bluff, springing up in alarm.

"I don----"

"Y-e-o-w!"

Tad had uttered the shrill scream. With great presence of mind he hoped to take them so by surprise that they would hesitate for the few seconds, and that in this delay he would be able to get away.

The lad's feet struck the ground, his body plunged forward and he fell sprawling at the very feet of the men he was seeking to get away from.

"Catch him! It's a man!" roared the leader.

With one accord they sprang for the prostrate form of Tad Butler.

CHAPTER IX

TAD OUTWITS HIS PURSUERS

Tad was lithe and supple. As the champion wrestler of the high school, back in his home town in Missouri, he was possessed of many tricks that had proved useful to him on more than one occasion since the Pony Riders set out on their summer's jaunt.

"Y-e-o-w!" yelled the lad in a high-pitched, piercing voice, intended to confuse his enemy. And it served its purpose well.

As the men leaped upon him, Tad raised himself to all fours, his back slightly arched. In this position he ran on hands and feet like a monkey, darting straight between the legs of the man with the beard.

The big man flattened himself on the ground face downward, while Tad, who had tripped him, was well outside the ring. In an instant the leader's fellows had dropped on him and the four men were floundering helplessly, in what, to all appearances, might have been a football scrimmage.

Tad was not yelling now. He was fairly flying, running on his toes and seeking to do so without making the slightest sound.

The men quickly untangled themselves and with yells of rage bounded from their camp in search of the one who had caused so much disturbance. It had all happened so quickly that they had not succeeded in getting a good look at their tormentor.

"It's a boy!" roared Bluff. "Catch him. No, shoot! Don't let him get away!"

"Where is he!"

"I don't know. Fan the bushes, fan everything. We've got to get him!"

"Keep it up. Do you see him?"