CHAPTER XIII.
INDIANS!
"Ah, now we are beginning to get into my own country again; this beginster look like home," exclaimed Bart Witherbee, one day as theadventurers made camp in a canyon in one of the southernmost spurs ofthe Rockies in the state of New Mexico. The boys had made the detour tothe south to avoid crossing the range itself, which would have been adifficult, if not an impossible, task in an aeroplane.
Still they had not sighted the rival racing air-craft, but they knewthat the others could not be far ahead now, as at a small settlementthey stopped at the day before they learned that the Slade party hadcalled at the blacksmith shop there to repair a truss brace that hadsnapped. As the facilities of the smithy were rather clumsy for the finework that has to be done on the aeroplane, the Slade machine was delayedseveral hours. So far as their judgment went, the boys decided that theother party could not be much more than fifty miles ahead of them.
As for the dirigible, they had heard that the expansion of its gas bag,caused by the sun, had compelled it to remain all one day in a smalltown in the Texas Panhandle, and that while it was journeying across thearid country it could travel only short distances. The boys, therefore,felt much cheered as at sundown they alighted by the side of a brawlingmountain stream and made camp. Bart Witherbee at once got out hisimprovised fishing tackle and started up the stream in search of trout,which he declared would abound in such waters.
"We'll have a change from canned beef, canned soup and canned vegetablesto-night, boys," he declared, "if I haven't lost the knack of it."
They listened to his heavy footsteps plunging up the steep hillside tillthey died out, and then took up the ordinary occupations of the camp.The rocky defile up which the old miner had disappeared on his quest waswell covered with pine timber almost down to where it reached the aridground on the edge of which the lads were camped. Except for theoccasional scream of a hawk making for its night roost, or the crash ofsome animal making its way through the dense growth that grew higher upon the hillside, the place was as quiet as a cemetery.
Billy Barnes was examining his camera, which had been severely shaken upon the trip, Frank and Harry were going over the _Golden Eagle_admiringly, remarking on the way she had stood her hard ordeal, and oldMr. Joyce was taking a lesson in wireless telegraphy from Lathrop. Itwas beginning to grow dusk. Somewhere far up on the hillside there camethe hoot of an owl. The hush of the evening in the foothills lay overeverything, when suddenly the silence was broken by a sound that broughtthem all to their feet.
The report of a rifle had rung out on the hillside above them.
"Must be Bart shooting at something," remarked Billy, gazing at thescared faces about him.
"That was a rifle shot," said Frank slowly, "and Bart Witherbee carriedno rifle."
"Then somebody else fired it?"
"That's about it. Don't make a sound now. Listen!"
They all held their breaths and waited anxiously in the stillness thatfollowed. For perhaps ten minutes they stood so, and then there came asharp crackle of snapping twigs, that told them some one was descendingthe hillside.
Who was it?
Several minutes of agonizing suspense followed before they knew whetherit was friend or enemy advancing toward them. Then Bart Witherbeeglided, like a snake, out of the woods.
"What's the mat----" began Frank. But he checked himself instantly.
Bart Witherbee's hand was held up.
Every one of the group read that mute signal aright.
Silence!
The old plainsman waited till he got right up to the group before hespoke, and then it was in a hushed tense whisper.
"Injuns," he said, "they're up on the hillside."
"How many?" whispered back Frank.
"I dunno exactly, after that there bullet I didn't wait ter see, andsay, boys, I had ter leave as nice a string of trout as you ever see upthere fer them pesky redskins ter git at."
"Never mind the fish, Bart," urged Frank, "tell us, is there danger?"
"There's allus danger when Injuns is aroun', and think they kin gitsomethin' that's vallerble without gitting in trouble over it," was thewesterner's reply.
"We'd better get away from here right away," exclaimed Harry.
"Not on your life, son," was Bart's reply; "not if I know anything aboutInjuns an' their ways. No, sons, my advice is ter git riddy fer 'em.They was startled when they see me, therefore they didn't know we wushere till they stumbled on me. That bein' the case, I reckin they don'tknow about that thar flying thing of you boys."
"And you think we can scare them with it?" began Frank eagerly.
"Not so fast, son, not so fast," reprimanded the old man. "Now, themInjuns won't attack afore dark, if they do at all. An' when they do,they'll come frum up the mountain-side. Now, my idee is to git that tharsearchlight o' yours rigged up, and hev it handy, so as when we hear atwig crack we kin switch it on and pick 'em out at our leisure."
"That's a fine idea, Bart, but what if they attack us from behind?"suggested Frank.
"They won't do that. Yer see, behind us it's all open country. Wall,Injuns like plenty of cover when they fight."
"Perhaps we could connect up some blue flares, and plant them on rocksup the hillside, and scare them that way," suggested Billy.
"That's a good idee, son, but who's goin' ter go up there an' light 'em?It would be certain death."
"Nobody would have to go up and light them," eagerly put in Harry. "Wecan wire them up and then just touch them off when we are ready. We canget plenty of spark by connecting up all our batteries."
"Wall, now, that's fine and dandy," exclaimed the miner admiringly, "seewhat it is ter hev an eddercation. Wall, boys, if we're goin' ter dothat, now's the time. Them Injuns won't attack afore dark, and if wewant ter git ready we'd better do it now."
While Frank and Harry planted the blue flares on rocks on the hillsidewithin easy range of the camp, and old Mr. Joyce utilized his electricalskill in wiring them up and connecting them to a common switch, Billyand Lathrop and Bart Witherbee struck camp and packed the paraphernaliain the tonneau of the auto.
"Better be ready ter make a quick gitaway," was the miner'srecommendation.
These tasks completed, there was nothing to do but to wait for a sign ofthe attack. This was nervous work. Bart had informed the boys that inhis opinion the Indians were a band from a reservation not many milesfrom there who had somehow got hold of a lot of "firewater" and had "gotbad."
"I'll bet yer there's troops after 'em now, if we did but know it," heopined.
"Well, I wish the troops would get here quick," bemoaned Harry.
"They won't git here in time ter be of much use ter us," remarked oldBart, grimly biting off a big chew of tobacco, "and now, boys, keepquiet, and mind, don't fire till I tell yer, and don't switch on themlights till I give you the word."
How long they waited neither Frank nor Harry nor any of the others couldever tell, but it seemed to be years before there came a sudden owl hootfar up on the hillside.
"Here they come, that's their signal," whispered old Bart in Frank'sear; "steady now."
"I'm all right," replied Frank, as calmly as he could, though his heartbeat wildly.
The hoot was answered by another one, and then all was silence.
Suddenly there came the crack of a twig somewhere above. It was only amite of a noise, but in the stillness it sounded as startling as apistol shot.
"We won't have to wait long now," commented Bart in a tense undertone;"all ready, now."
Each of the boys gripped his rifle determinedly. Old Mr. Joyce had beenarmed with a pistol. At their elbows lay their magazine revolvers fullyloaded.
Following the first snapping of the twig there was a long interval ofsilence. Then the staccato rattle of a small dislodged rock boundingdown the hillside set all hearts to beating once more.
The attack was evidently not to be delayed many mo
ments now.
It came with the suddenness of the bursting of a tropical storm.
Hardly had the boys drawn their breath following the breathless suspensethat ensued on the falling of the rock before there was a wild yell, andhalf a dozen dark forms burst out of the trees. They were received witha fusillade, but none of them were hurt, as they all vanished almost asquickly as they had appeared.
"That was just to see if we was on the lookout," said old Bart in awhisper. "I reckon they found we was. Look out for the next attack."
They hadn't long to wait. There was a rattle of falling stones as themain body rushed down the hillside.
"_Now!_"
Old Bart fairly screamed the command in his excitement.
At the same instant Billy shoved over the switch that connected thesparking wires of the blue-flare battery with the electric supply forthe wireless, and the whole woodland was instantly illumined as if bythe most brilliant moonlight.
With cries and yells of amazement, a score of the attacking redskinswheeled and vanished into the dark shadows of the hillside. The lightsglared up, brilliantly illuminating everything in the vicinity, but theIndians were far too scared to come out of their hiding-place and renewthe attack.
"Fire a volley up the hillside," ordered Bart. "We can't hit any of 'em,but it will add to their scare and keep 'em off till I can work out aplan."
There was a rattling discharge of shots, which met with no return, andthen, as the lights began to burn dimly Bart ordered Frank and Harry toget into the aeroplane and sail into the air.
"Turn your searchlight on the wood from up above, and they'll run fromhere to San Franciskey," he declared.
Though rather dubious of the success of the experiment, the boys obeyed,and in a few seconds the roaring drone of the engine was heard far abovethe wood, while the great eye of the searchlight seemed to penetrateinto its darkest depths.
If the boys had had any doubt as to the feasibility of Bart's recipe forscaring Indians they regained their faith then and there. With yellsthat echoed into the night, the redskins ran for their lives, tumblingover each other in their hurry to escape the "Air Devil."
What the blue lights had begun the aeroplane had completed.
"It's goin' ter take a year ter round them fellers up ag'in," commentedBart.