The Desert Trail

"You can search me!" railed De Lancey. "Seems like everybody quits you down here the minute you get into trouble. I got arrested night before last by those damned rurales– Manuel Del Rey was behind it, you can bet your life on that – and I've been here ever since!"

"Well, what are you pinched for? Who do I go and see?"

"Pinched for nothing!" cried De Lancey bitterly. "Pinched because I'm a Mexican citizen and can't protect myself! I'm incomunicado for three days!"

"Well, I'll get you out, all right," said Hooker, leaning closer against the bars. "Here, have a smoke – did they frisk you of your makings?"

"No," snapped De Lancey crossly, "but I'm out of everything by this time. Bud, I tell you I've had a time of it! They threw me in here with this crazy, murdering Mexican and I haven't had a wink of sleep for two days. He's quiet now, but I don't want any more."

"Well, say," began Bud again, "what are you charged with? Maybe I can grease somebody's paw and get you out tonight!"

There was an awkward pause at this, and finally De Lancey dropped his white face against the bars and his voice became low and beseeching.

"I'll tell you, Bud," he said, "I haven't been quite on the square with you – I've been holding out a little. But you know how it is – when a fellow's in love. I've been going to see Gracia!"

"Oh!" commented Hooker, and stood very quiet while he waited.

"Yes, I've been going to see her," hurried on Phil. "I know I promised; but honest, Bud, I couldn't help it. It just seemed as if my whole being was wrapped up in her, and I had to do it. She'd be looking for me when I came and went – and then I fixed it with her maid to take her a letter. And then I met her secretly, back by the garden gate. You know they've got some holes punched in the wall – loopholed during the fight last summer – and we'd – "

"Sure, I'll take your word for that," broke in Hooker harshly. "But get to the point! What are you pinched for?"

"Well," went on De Lancey, his voice quavering at the reproof, "I was going to tell you, if you'll listen to me. Somebody saw us there and told Aragon – he shut her up for a punishment and she slipped me out a note. She was lonely, she said. And that night – well, I couldn't stand it – I hired the string band and we went down there in a hack to give her a serenade. But this cad, Manuel del Rey, who has been acting like a jealous ass all along, swooped down on us with a detachment of his rurales and took us all to jail. He let the musicians out the next morning, but I've been here ever since."

"Yes, and what are you charged with?" demanded Bud bruskly.

"Drunk," confessed Phil, and Bud grunted.

"Huh!" he said, "and me out watching that mine night and day!"

"Oh, I know I've done you dirt, Bud," wailed De Lancey; "but I didn't mean to, and I'll never do it again."

"Never do what?" inquired Bud roughly.

"I won't touch another drop of booze as long as I'm in Mexico!" cried Phil. "Not a drop!"

"And how about the girl?" continued Bud inexorably. "Her old man was out and tried to jump our mine to-day – how about her?"

"Well," faltered De Lancey, "I'll – she – "

"You know your promise!" reminded Bud.

"Yes; I know. But – oh, Bud, if you knew how loyal I've been to you – if you knew what offers I've resisted – the mine stands in my name, you know."

"Well?"

"Well, Aragon came around to me last week and said if I'd give him a half interest in it he'd – well, never mind – it was a great temptation. But did I fall for it? Not on your life! I know you, Bud, and I know you're honest – you'd stay by me to the last ditch, and I'll do the same by you. But I'm in love, Bud, and that would make a man forget his promise if he wasn't true as steel."

"Yes," commented Hooker dryly. "I don't reckon I can count on you much from now on. Here, take a look at this and see what you make of it." He drew the piece of ore that he had taken from Aragon from his pocket and held it up in the moonlight. "Well, feel of it, then," he said. "Shucks, you ought to know that piece of rock, Phil – it's the first one we found in our mine!"

"No!" exclaimed De Lancey, starting back. "Why – where'd you get it?"

"Never mind where I got it!" answered Hooker. "The question is: What did you do with it?"

"Well, I might as well come through with it," confessed Phil, the last of his assurance gone. "I gave it to Gracia!"

"And I took it away from Aragon," continued Bud, "while he was digging some more chunks out of our mine. So that is your idea of being true as steel, is it? You've done noble by me and Kruger, haven't you? Yes, you've been a good pardner, I don't think!"

"Well, don't throw me down, Bud!" pleaded Phil. "There's some mistake somewhere. Her father must have found it and taken it away! I'd stake my life on it that Gracia would never betray me!"

"Well, think it over for a while," suggested Bud, edging his words with sarcasm. "I'm going up to the hotel!"

"No; come back!" cried De Lancey, clamoring at the bars. "Come on back, Bud! Here!" he said, thrusting his hand out through the heavy irons. "I'll give you my word for it – I won't see her again until we get our title! Will that satisfy you? Then give me your hand, pardner – I'm sorry I did you wrong!"

"It ain't me," replied Hooker soberly, as he took the trembling hand; "it's Kruger. But if you'll keep your word, Phil, maybe we can win out yet. I'm going up to find the comisario."

A brief interview with that smiling individual and the case of Phil De Lancey was laid bare. He had been engaged in a desperate rivalry with Manuel del Rey for the hand of Gracia Aragon, and his present incarceration was not only for singing rag-time beneath the Aragon windows, but for trying to whip the captain of the rurales when the latter tried to place him under arrest.

And De Lancey was the prisoner not of the comisario, but of the captain of the rurales. Sore at heart, Bud rode up through the Mexican quarters to the cuartel of the rurales, but the captain was inexorable.

"No, señor," he said, waving an eloquent finger before his nose, "I cannot release your friend. No, señor."

"But what is he charged with," persisted Bud, "and when is his trial? You can't keep him shut up without a trial."

At this the captain of the rurales lifted his eyebrows and one closely waxed mustachio and smiled mysteriously.

"Y como no?" he inquired. "And why not? Is he not a Mexican citizen?"

"Well, perhaps he is," thundered Bud, suddenly rising to his full height, "but I am not! I am an American, Señor Capitan, and there are other Americans! If you hold my friend without a trial I will come and tear your jail down – and the comisario will not stop me, either!"

"Ah!" observed the dandy little captain shrugging his mustachio once more and blinking, and while Hooker raged back and forth he looked him over appraisingly.

"One moment!" he said at last, raising a quieting hand. "These are perilous times, señor, in which all the defenders of Fortuna should stand together. I do not wish to have a difference with the Americans when Bernardo Bravo and his men are marching to take our town. No, I value the friendship of the valiant Americans very highly – so I will let your friend go. But first he must promise me one thing – not to trouble the Señor Aragon by making further love to his daughter!"

"Very well!" replied Bud. "He has already promised that to me; so come on and let him out."

"To you?" repeated Manuel del Rey with a faint smile. "Then, perhaps – "

"Perhaps nothing!" broke in Hooker shortly. "Come on!"

He led the way impatiently while the captain, his saber clanking, strode out and rode beside him. He was not a big man, this swashing captain of the rural police, but he was master, nevertheless, of a great district, from Fortuna to the line, with a reputation for quick work in the pursuance of his duty as well as in the primrose ways of love.

In the insurrections and raidings of the previous summer he had given the coup de grâce with his revolver to more than one embryo bandit, and in his love-affairs he had shown that he could be equally summary.

The elegant Feliz Luna, who for a time had lingered near the charming Gracia, had finally found himself up against a pair of pistols with the option of either fighting Captain del Rey or returning to his parents. The young man concluded to beat a retreat. For a like offense Philip De Lancey had been unceremoniously thrown into jail; and now the capitan turned his attention to Bud Hooker, whose mind he had not yet fathomed.

"Excuse me, señor," he said, after a brief silence, "but your words left me in doubt – whether to regard you as a friend or a rival."

"What?" demanded Bud, whose knowledge of Spanish did not extend to the elegancies.