Jack Ranger's Gun Club: or, From Schoolroom to Camp and Trail

A DANGEROUS DESCENT

Jack looked down at his chums from his seat in the big wagon beside Mabel.

“Aren’t you going to get aboard?” he asked with a smile.

“Are we going to start soon?” asked Nat.

“As soon as our stuff is loaded in the freight wagon,” replied Jack. “Why?”

“I want to get my gun,” replied Nat. “We may see something to shoot at.”

“Not much around here,” commented Mr. Pierce. “Better leave your truck all together until you get to camp. It’ll carry better that way.”

“Juthinkwe’llseeanyrobbers?” asked Budge suddenly.

“I beg your pardon,” said Mr. Pierce slowly, while a look of surprise slowly spread over his face. “But what was that remark you just made?”

For Budge had not talked much, thus far on the journey, and when he had spoken he had not used any of his conglomerated remarks.

“He merely inquired if you thought we’d see any robbers,” answered Sam with a smile.

“’SwatIsaid,” added Budge, rapidly chewing gum in his excitement.

“No, I don’t cal’alate we’ll meet up with any bandits,” answered Mabel’s father with a smile. “If we do – well, Tanker Ike and I are pretty well heeled, I guess,” and he lifted from his side coat pocket, where he carried it as if it was a pound of sugar, a revolver of large size.

“Oh, daddy! Don’t bring out that horrid gun!” exclaimed Mabel.

“I thought Western girls were used to guns and such things,” remarked Jack.

“So she is,” said her father. “Mabel is as good a shot with the rifle as I am, but somehow she don’t exactly seem to cotton to these pocket pistols.”

“I think they’re dangerous,” explained the girl with a glance at Jack that set his heart to beating faster again. “I don’t mind a rifle, but for all daddy says so, I’m not as good a shot as he is.”

“I’d like to see you shoot,” said Jack.

“Maybe you will – if you come to see me – I mean us,” she corrected herself quickly, with a blush.

“I’ll come,” said Jack.

Meanwhile, Mr. Blender and some men from the railroad freight office were loading the other wagon. This was one with a canvas top, something like the prairie schooners of the early Western days, and was drawn by a team of four mules. The passenger vehicle was hauled by four horses.

“Well, I guess I’ve got everything in,” commented Tanker Ike. “Now it’s up to you boys to get the game. There’s plenty of it, and I expect when you come back here to take a train East you’ll have a great collection.”

“We’ll try,” answered Jack.

“All aboard!” sung out Mr. Blender, and Sam, Bony and Budge, together with Nat, who had been wandering about, looking at the view, started to climb up into the big wagon. Jack had not relinquished his seat by Mabel’s side, and he was oblivious to the winks and grins of his chums.

“Have you got a good seat, Jack?” asked Sam, giving Nat a nudge in the ribs.

“I’ve got the best seat in the wagon,” replied Jack boldly, and Mabel seemed to find something very interesting on the opposite side of the vehicle from where Jack sat at her elbow.

Mr. Pierce and Mr. Blender took their places on the front seat, the four other boys distributing themselves in the rear, while a teamster in charge of the freight wagon drove the mules that were to haul the camping outfit over the desert and mountains.

It was fine, clear weather, not cold, in spite of the lateness of the season, and the boys, as well as all the others in the party, were in fine spirits.

“Hurrah for Jack Ranger’s gun club!” cried Nat, when they started off, the horses and mules plunging forward in response to pistol-like cracks of the long whips.

“That’s right!” sung out Sam.

“Is it your gun club?” asked Mabel.

“Well, they call it that,” explained Jack, as he told how it came to be formed.

“Cæsar’s side saddles!” suddenly exclaimed Nat, when they had gone a little farther. “Did you see that rabbit? It was as big as a dog!”

“That’s a jack-rabbit,” explained Mr. Pierce.

“Why didn’t I keep out my gun?” asked Sam with regret in his voice. “I’d like a shot at it. That’s the biggest game I’ve seen in some time.”

“Wait until you see a mule deer, or a big-horn sheep,” said Mr. Blender. “Then you can talk.”

They continued on slowly for several miles, the view changing every moment, and bringing forth exclamations of astonishment and delight from the boys. To Jack and Nat, who had been West before, there was not so much novelty in it, but Sam, Budge and Bony said they had never seen such beautiful aspects of mountain and valley.

They stopped at noon to get dinner at a stage station, and though the place was of the “rough and ready” style, the meal was good.

“’Sanycowboys?” asked Budge of Jack, as they came out to resume their journey.

“I suppose you mean where are any cowboys,” said Jack, and Budge nodded, being too busily engaged in preparing a fresh wad of gum at that moment to answer in words.

“There aren’t many around here,” explained Mr. Pierce, who had heard Jack’s interpretation of the question. “Oh, the West isn’t half so wild and woolly as some book writers make it out to be.”

“Are you boys pretty good at going dry?” asked Tanker Ike, turning to Jack, when they had accomplished several miles more of their journey.

“Going dry?” repeated our hero.

“Yes. Can you go without a drink if you have to?”

“Why?”

“Well, you see, we’ll start to cross the desert to-morrow, and though we’ll take plenty of water along, you never can tell what will happen. It usually takes two days to make it, but sometimes an accident happens to a wagon, or a horse or a mule may go lame, and then you’re longer on the trip. When you are, your water doesn’t always last, and many a time I’ve finished the journey with my tongue hanging out of my mouth, and the poor beasts as dry as powder-horns. So I just thought I’d ask you if you were pretty good at going dry.”

“Well, Nat and I were shipwrecked once,” answered Jack, “and if it hadn’t rained we’d have been in a bad way, eh, Nat?”

“That’s what. Sanctified sand-fleas! but that was a tough time,” he added, as he thought of the cruise of the Polly Ann.

“Well, it never rains on this desert,” commented Mr. Pierce.

“Can’t you carry enough water so that if you’re four days instead of two crossing the desert you’ll have plenty?” asked Bony.