The Border Boys on the Trail

"Yep; but we'll soon be on American soil, sonny, don't forget that."

"Not likely to," rejoined Jack fervently.

After half an hour's riding, the great water-works came into full view. There was a massive, containing-wall of cement, with a pathway along the top, and in the center the trailers could see the machinery used for opening and closing the sluice pipes that fed the irrigation canal. Word was telephoned from the land company's offices in Maguez to the dam-keeper regarding the pressure to be used, and, in accordance with their instructions, he turned on more or less.

At the near side of the dam was a small building in which the dam-keeper made his home. From its roof there extended a pole, from which, to Jack's intense delight, they could see a thin wire stretching off to the north. On that wire now depended so much that Jack almost felt like taking his hat off to it and to the inventor of telephones.

"Geddap!" urged Jim Hicks, cracking his quirt about the haunches of his pack animals. The little cavalcade broke into a brisk trot. The dust spurted from under their rattling hoofs.

"We're coming on in style," laughed Jack, as they came briskly down the last few rods of the trail.

"Don't see old Simmons about," commented Jim Hicks, looking for some sign of the dam-keeper. "Guess he's taking a snooze some place. Hey, Sam! Sam!"

"Here he comes," said Jack briskly, as the door of the dam-tender's hut opened. But the next moment every member of the approaching party gave a gasp of dismay. Jim Hicks spasmodically jerked up his rifle to his shoulder, but instantly lowered it again.

From the door of the hut there had stepped out, not old Sam Simmons, the dam-tender, but – Black Ramon and six of his men!

They held their weapons grimly leveled at Jack Merrill and his companion, while Ramon sharply bade them dismount.

"We have prepared for you what we must call a little surprise party," he said. "Please tie your horses and we will go inside."

Resistance was useless, and they obeyed.

To understand how this came about, we must revert for a moment to events which had been taking place at the old Mission and at the Rancho Agua Caliente while we have been following the young adventurers and their companions. We left Mr. Merrill and his cow-punchers riding back toward the ranch with heavy hearts, bearing with them the wounded Mexican, from whom they hoped to gain some information concerning Black Ramon's whereabouts.

On the arrival of the disconsolate party at the ranch house, Mr. Merrill had at once sent out a call to his neighbors, and they came riding in from miles around to a consultation. All agreed that it would be a grave invasion of international law to send an armed party over the border, but it was agreed that, providing the Mexican recovered it would be legitimate to surround Black Ramon's rendezvous – that is, if the prisoner revealed it – and demand the surrender of the prisoners. The Mexican authorities would then be informed and, if possible, Black Ramon given over to justice.

This course would have been followed at once but for two reasons. Mr. Merrill and his brother ranchers felt that to act prematurely might ruin everything, and the wounded Mexican obstinately refused to get better. Still another obstacle, was the great chasm left by the blowing up of the bridge. It would be impossible to pass this. Just when this difficulty seemed in its most serious phase, an old rancher spoke up and volunteered to guide the party by a secret trail he knew of, which led over the mountains and across the border.

As he spoke, the wounded Mexican, who for better attention and observation had been laid on a cot in the living room of the ranch house, stirred uneasily.

"Hullo, he's coming to," exclaimed Mr. Merrill bending over him, but the man's eyes remained closed, and he seemed, to all intents and purposes, as badly off as he had been before. For two days he remained thus, and the ranchers carried on their consultations freely before him, little dreaming what a hornets' nest they were preparing to bring down about their own heads. On the morning of the third day, when Mr. Merrill awakened he was astonished to find that the Mexican's cot was empty. The man was gone! A search showed that he was not about the place, and a further investigation revealed the fact that one of the best horses on the ranch was missing.

The wounded Mexican had been "playing possum" just as a wounded animal will sometimes do, awaiting but the slightest relaxation of vigilance to be up and off.

The consternation this caused may be imagined. If the man understood English, and there seemed little room to doubt that he did – otherwise he would have had no object in deceiving them as to his real condition – the ranchers' plans must by this time be known to Black Ramon. Mr. Merrill was in despair for a time, but finally, as a last recourse, and even at the risk of upsetting everything, he decided to call up Los Hominos, a considerable town in Chihuahua province, and request that soldiers be sent in pursuit of Black Ramon.

None knew better than Mr. Merrill the danger he thus incurred of having his plans doubly revealed to the chief of the cattle rustlers. The country posts of the Mexican army are largely recruited from men in sympathy with the lawless element – especially if that lawless element confines itself to preying on Americanos. There was, therefore, a grave risk that some traitor in the ranks might convey the news of Mr. Merrill's request to Black Ramon. That it was no time for doubts or hesitation, however, every rancher felt, and on the top of Mr. Merrill's message preparations were at once made for a start across the border by the ranchers themselves.

In the meantime, the captured Mexican, whose wound, though severe, still allowed him to ride, was spurring on his way across the Hachetas to Black Ramon's headquarters in the old Mission. It has been said that the greatest blackguards have sometimes the most faithful followers, and this seemed to be the case with the Mexican miscreant, for his underling, despite the pain of his wound and his weakened condition, did not hesitate an instant over taking a ride which might have caused even a slightly wounded man to pause and reflect on the undertaking.

Thus it had come about, that, at the same time that Jack Merrill and Coyote Pete, escorted by the eccentric prospector, were setting out to get in communication with civilization, Black Ramon and six of his most trusted followers had started for the land company's dam, with what a heinous purpose in view we shall presently see. The Mexican was in the blackest of moods. He had hardly returned from his vain chase after Jack Merrill and the cow-puncher before word had been brought to him that his other prisoners had escaped.

The Mexican was almost beside himself with rage as he heard this, and, in addition, news had been brought to him that Mr. Merrill had requisitioned that a band of soldiers be sent in search of him. Armed also with the wounded man's story of the pursuit of the ranchers by means of the secret trail, Ramon was indeed almost desperate when he set out with the intention of accomplishing the deed he had in mind. He felt he would render his name hateful to Americans and glorious to border Mexicans forever, and was all the more anxious to achieve it for that reason.

His astonishment, therefore, when he heard Coyote Pete's hail and emerged from the dam-tender's hut to find his escaped prisoners walking right into his net again, was only equalled by his delight. As his followers bound each of the three hand and foot, after roughly dragging them from their ponies, Black Ramon rubbed his hands gleefully.

"You are going to see a sight before long that you will remember all your days," he said, as the Americans, scornfully disdaining to utter a word, were carried into the hut.

"What, you do not answer?"

"No, you yellow dog," grunted Jim Hicks disdainfully, "I'm mighty particular who I talk to."

Beside himself with fury at the American's calm contempt, the Mexican opened his palm and struck the bound and helpless miner a blow across the face. Jim Hicks' ruddy, bronzed countenance went white as dead ashes.

"You'll be sorry for that, you greaser, some day," he said in a quiet, controlled tone, which to those who knew him signified trouble.

"Some day, yes!" laughed Ramon; "but I shall be far away some day, amigo, but before I go I am going to give you Americanos a lesson you will never forget. The father of this boy here, and twelve other rancheros, are riding through the American foothills now to your rescue. But they will never reach the mountains. Why? – Ah, you will soon see."

As they were carried into the hut and thrown roughly on the floor, Jim Hicks' eyes espied poor Sam Simmons, the tender of the dam. The employee of the water company was also bound hand and foot, and seemed to have been beaten into submission by the brutal Mexicans. He gave a slight groan as he saw the plight of the new-comers, but made no other sign.

"He resisted us," laughed Black Ramon harshly, "see what happened to him. It is a good thing you gave in without making trouble."

As he spoke, there came a long, low grumble that shook the earth and made the furniture in the hut rattle. It was the near approach of the storm the captives had noticed impending. At the same instant, there came a dazzling flash of lambent lightning. It illumined the cruel faces about them as if a flickering calcium had been thrown upon them.

The advancing storm seemed to have a strange effect on Sam Simmons; he stirred in his thongs and a pitiful expression came over his bruised face.

"The storm! the storm!" he cried. "Hark! it is coming. Let me out to tend the gates."

"Not likely," sneered Black Ramon, turning from him contemptuously.

"But the sluices must be opened. The rain is coming!" cried the old man, seemingly galvanized into life by the call of duty. "Let me loose, I say."

"Be quiet," snarled Ramon. "Do you want another dose of the same medicine?"

The old man quivered pitifully, while the others looked on with eyes that burned with indignation.

"If they are not opened, the dam will burst," begged the old man. "It is weakened now, I tell you. It cannot stand the pressure of more water. Let me up, and then you can tie me again."

Ramon seemed suddenly interested.

"You say that if the sluices are not opened the dam will burst?" he asked.

"Yes, yes! Let me up, I must open them. I – "

"Silence! And if they burst what will happen?"

"Why, the whole valley from here down is a trough! The water will rush down and destroy many lives and acres of property. Let me up, for Heaven's sake, Ramon, or if you will not let me do it, open the sluices yourself. You do not know what you are doing – every moment counts."

Again the thunder roared, and a blinding flash illumined with a blue, steely radiance the strange scene in the old dam-tender's shanty. In the brief period of lighting, Jack Merrill surprised a wickedly radiant look on Ramon's face. At the same instant a few heavy drops of rain fell on the roof.

"Hark! The rain!" cried the old man; "for mercy's sake, let me out. It is my duty."

"Which you will not perform to-night," sneered the Mexican, as the storm increased; "this storm saves us the use of dynamite."

In one dreadful flash of insight, Jack Merrill realized the Mexican's terrible plan. He had intended to blow up the dam and flood the valley below. The storm had taken the work out of his hands. The heavy rain-fall would swell the dam till the weak containing wall broke. In a few short hours every ranch in the course of the bursting dam would be devastated. Yes, that was what the fruit rancher at Maguez had told them. And there was nothing he could do but lie there powerlessly. The boy's brain seemed to be on fire, but in his veins was ice.

Suddenly Black Ramon spoke. For an instant Jack thought he had repented, but his words dashed that hope almost as it was born. The Mexican issued a sharp order to two of his men.