CHAPTER XIV
THE WITNESS
The morning was hardly two hours old, and the crisp air was stingingsweet with the tang of pine and fir, as Rathburn rode jauntily downthe trail on the eastern slope of the divide and drew rein on thecrest of a high ridge. As he looked below he whistled softly.
"Juniper, hoss, there's folks down there plying a nefarious trade, aplumb dangerous trade," he mused, digging for the tobacco and brownpapers in the pocket of his shirt. "I reckon they're carrying on indirect defiance of the law, hoss."
The dun-colored mustang tossed his head impatiently, but his masterignored the animal's fretful desire to be off and dallied with tobaccoand paper, fashioning a cigarette, lighting it, breathing thin smokeas his gray eyes squinted appraisingly at the scene below.
Winding down into the foothills, in striking contrast to the dimtrails higher up, was a well-used road. It evidently led from thesaffron-tinted dump and gray buildings of a mine which showed on theside of a big, bald mountain to southward. At a point almost directlybelow the ridge where the man and horse stood, it crossed a smallhogback and descended a steep slope between lines of jack pines,disappearing in the timber farther down.
The gaze of the man on the ridge was concentrated on the bit of roadwhich showed on the hogback and the slope beyond. A truck waslaboriously climbing the ascent. But the watcher evidently was not somuch concerned with the approach of the truck as with certainmovements which were in progress on the hogback at the head of thegrade.
Three persons had dismounted from their horses behind the screen oftimber. One, a tall man, had donned a long, black slicker and wastying a handkerchief about his face.
"Juniper, hoss," said Rathburn, "what does that gent want that slickeron for? It ain't going to rain. An' how does he reckon to see onlessmaybe he's got holes cut in that there hanky?"
A second man had made his way down the slope a short distance. He tookadvantage of the timber which screened him from sight of the driver ofthe oncoming truck.
"I 'spect that's in case the truck driver should suddenly take it intohis head to slide down backwards," said the observer, speaking histhoughts aloud in a musical, bass voice. "One in front, one behind;now how about the kid?"
As if in answer to his question the third member of the party,evidently a boy, led the horses a short way up the hogback where agood view could be obtained of the road in both directions.
The watcher grunted in approval. "One in front to do the stick-up, onebehind to stop a retreat and get whatever it is they're after, and oneon the lookout to see there ain't any unexpected guests. Couldn't haveplanned the lay any better ourselves, hoss."
He was too far distant to interfere, even if he had had any desire todo so, which was doubtful from his interested and tolerant manner.Anyway it could have done no good to shout a warning, for the driverof the truck could not have heard anything above the roar of hismachine, and the trio had gone about the preparations with dispatch.Already the truck was climbing the last steep pitch to the top of thehogback.
The tall man in the black slicker and mask now quickly stepped forthfrom the edge of the timber. The watcher above saw his right hand andarm whip out level with his shoulders. There was a glint of morningsunlight and dull metal. The truck came to a jarring stop as thedriver jammed on the brakes. Then the driver's hands went into theair.
Stepping from the timber at the roadside behind the truck, the secondman leaped upon the machine. The watcher grunted again as he saw thatthis man was also masked. The driver was disarmed and searched, thenforced to clamber down from the truck into the road, where the man inthe slicker kept him covered while the other quickly searched aboutthe seat and cab of the truck. Then the second man released the brakesand dropped nimbly from the machine which plunged backward down thesteep slope, crashed into the tree growth on one side of the road, andoverturned.
The boy mounted and led the other two horses down the hogback in thescanty timber to the head of the grade. There the man in the slickerand his companion joined him, mounted, and the trio rode quickly alongthe hogback in a southerly direction and disappeared on a blind railinto the forest.
Rathburn rolled himself another cigarette with a grin as he watchedthe truck driver stand for some moments uncertainly in the road andthen start rapidly down the slope toward his disabled machine.
"C'mon, hoss," said the erstwhile spectator, turning his dun-coloredmount again into the trail. "So far's I can make out, this is the onlyway down out of these tall mountains to the east, so we might as wellget going. We ain't got no business south or west. We'll be just intime to get blamed for what's happened down there."
Whatever there might be in the prospect, the rider did not permit itto have any influence on his cheerful mood. He drew in long breaths ofthe stimulating air and sniffed joyously at the fragrance of themurmuring forests which clothed the higher hills. Far below the timberwould dwindle, the ridges would flatten into round knolls and losetheir verdure; then would come the dust and lava slopes, andbeyond--the desert.
A wistful light came into the horseman's eyes. "Home, Juniper, hoss,"he said softly. "We've just got to have cactus an' water holes an'danged blistering heat in ours; and I don't care so much as the fadedlabel off an empty tomato can if it's in California, or Arizona, orNevada, so long as it's desert!"
The trail he was following wound tortuously around ridges, through thetimber, into ravines and canyons; now treading close upon the bank of aswift-running mountain stream in a narrow valley, and again seekingthe higher places where there were rocks and fallen trees and otherobstructions. An observer would have gleaned at once that the riderwas not familiar with the trail or territory he traversed.
So it was past noon when he finally reached the hogback where theoutstanding event of the morning had taken place. The rider lookedback up toward the divide and grinned as he rested his horse justabove the scene of the holdup.
"Don't reckon they'd have heard me if I'd hollered, or seen me if I'dwaved," he mused. "They picked out a good spot for the dirty work," heconcluded, looking about.
Shortly afterward, as he was staring down at the tracks in the road,he smothered an exclamation. Then he dismounted, picked up two smallobjects from the dust at the point where the trio had started ontheir get-away, examined them with a puzzled expression, and thrustthem into a pocket.
"Queer," he ruminated; "mighty queer. If those silly things had beenlaying there in the road before the rumpus they'd have been trackedinto the dust. But they was on _top_ of a perfectly good hoss track.An' it don't look like there's been anybody along here since."
He continued down the road, descending the steep slope, and came tothe overturned truck. At a glance he saw it had been used for haulingsupplies, doubtless to the mine he had glimpsed on the slope of thehigh mountain to southward. Several kegs of nails, some hardware, andsome sacks of cement were scattered in the road. He remembered thatthe man who had climbed on the truck had only searched the driver andthe cab. Anything he might have taken must have been in a smallpackage or it would have been discernible even at that long distance.
"That outfit wasn't after no mine supplies," Rathburn reflected as hefinished his brief inspection and again mounted. "An' they wasn'ttaking any chances on smoking anybody up or being followed too quick.Pretty work all around. An' here's the committee, hoss!"
A touring car came careening around a turn in the road and racedtoward him. He turned his horse to the side of the road and spoke tohim as the animal, plainly unfamiliar with motor cars, snorted andshied.
The car drew to a stop with a screeching of brakes. The horsemanraised his hands as he saw two rifles leveled at him from the rearseat. There were five men in the car besides the driver. One of themen, who had been sitting in the front with the driver, leaped fromthe machine and strode toward the rider.
"Calm that horse down an' climb out of that saddle," he commanded."If you make any motions toward that gun you're packing, it'll makethings simpler, in a way."
The rider slipped from the saddle with a broad grin. "Right up toform," he sang cheerfully, although he kept his hands elevated whilethe other took his gun. "My hoss'll be calm enough now that thatdanged thing is shut off. You must be a sheriff to be flirting withthe speed limit that way an' forgetting you've got a horn."
"Where are you from an' where was you going?" demanded the other.
"I'm from up in the mountains, but I'd never got where I was going ifI hadn't seen you first the way you busted around that curve," was thecool reply.
"Stranger," was the next comment in a tone of satisfaction. "Lookhere, friend, I'm Mannix, deputy from High Point. You'll sail smootherif you answer my questions straight."
The deputy motioned to two men in the car. "Search him," he ordered.Then he stood back, six-shooter in hand.
The stranger built a cigarette while the men were going through him.He lighted the weed and smiled quizzically while they examined themeager contents of the slicker pack on the rear of his saddle.
"See you're packing a black slicker," said Mannix, pointing to therough raincoat in which the pack was wrapped.
"That's in case of rain," was the ready answer.
"What's your name?" asked the deputy with a frown.
"Rathburn."
"Where was you heading?"
"I was aiming in a general eastern direction," Rathburn replied in adrawl. "Is there any law against ridin' hosses in this here part ofthe country?"
"Not at all," replied the deputy heartily. "An' there's no law againstdrivin' automobiles or trucks. But there's a law against stoppin' 'emwith a gun."
"So," said Rathburn. "You stopped because you saw my gun? An' I'm toblame, for it? If I'd known you were touchy about guns down here I'dhave worn mine in my shirt."
One of the other men from the car had joined the deputy. He waslooking at Rathburn keenly. Mannix turned to him.
"Look like him?" he asked.
The man nodded. "About the same size and height."
"This man was drivin' a truck up here that was stopped this morning,"said the deputy sternly to Rathburn. "He says you size up to one ofthe men that turned the trick--one of them that wore a black slickerlike yours."
Rathburn nodded pleasantly. "Exactly," he said with a smile. "I happento be in the country an' I've got a black slicker. There you are;everything all proved up. An' yet there was somebody once told me ittook brains to be a sheriff!"
There was a glint in Rathburn's eyes as he uttered the last sentence.
Instead of flying into a rage, Mannix laughed.
"Don't kid yourself," he said grimly. "You're not the man who held upthis truck driver."
He gave Rathburn back his gun, to the latter's surprise. Then he wavedtoward Rathburn's horse.
"Go ahead," he said, smiling. "General eastern direction, wasn't it?This road will take you clean to the desert, if you want to go thatfar. So long."
He led the others back to the car which started off with a roar. Itpassed the truck and continued on up the road.
Rathburn sat his horse and watched the automobile out of sight. Hisexpression was one of deep perplexity.
"By all the rules of the game that fellow should have held me as asuspect," he soliloquized. "Now he don't know me from a hoss thief--ordoes he?"
He frowned and rode thoughtfully down the road in the direction fromwhich the automobile had come.
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