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Updated: May 6, 2025
If you and your friends are out for a little excitement, just take my tip and turn your attention to jumping a coyote or you may " "We are not after excitement," retorted the boy from the Half-Moon Ranch. "We don't have to go looking for it. We've got all we want. Some of Megget's gang have raided our herd." "No? It must have been them I saw over near the hills early this morning."
"That's Megget's work!" ejaculated Snider as the story was completed. "He's the only one cute enough and with nerve enough to do it. I didn't suppose any one knew my herd was unwatched, yet the minute my boys ride in the gang raids it. Wilder, if you and I are to stay on our ranches, we must round up these cattle thieves." "That's my idea exactly," declared the owner of the Half-Moon.
"But what grudge has Megget against me?" asked Mr. Wilder in surprise. "You are the one who leased the Long Creek bottoms, aren't you?" returned Nails, answering the question, Yankee fashion, by another. "To be sure. But what has that to do with it?" "Everything. Megget's been rustling cattle for years, and the Long Creek bottoms were where he used to drive the cattle he'd lifted.
"That's easy," returned the captive, and without wasting words, he related the incidents of the pursuit of the three boys, Megget's signals, the order to set the fire and his own action that alone had saved the herd at the pool from destruction. In silence, now looking at one another in amazement and then at the speaker, the cowboys listened.
"I'm Bobby Lawrence, and I was hunting for my tobacco pouch," returned the fellow, undaunted by the angry faces gazing at him. "That's the name of one of Megget's right-hand men," declared Nails. "I found that out at Tolopah." With no gentle hands half a dozen of the cowboys searched Lawrence, taking from him his pistols and a long knife. When their prisoner was harmless Mr.
Disappointed to think they would not be able to pick up chunks of the ore, the comrades lapsed into silence till Tom suddenly bethought him of the men he had seen crossing the cliff on the night of their hunting trip, and he lost no time in asking if they were some of Megget's gang. "Must have been Gus and the boys who were with him up in Oklahoma," declared the guide.
Yet how he could prevent it, he was at a loss to determine until suddenly he remembered that Red Ike had asked him for a match that afternoon. As the thought flashed through his mind that his companion had no means for carrying out Megget's instructions Lawrence put his hand to his belt, where he carried his tobacco outfit, and quickly unloosening it, let it fall into the grass.
Without waiting for orders from their master, the boys of the Three Stars ran to the corral, all agog with the excitement at the unexpected turn of affairs. When the two ranch owners were alone Mr. Wilder imparted his information about Megget's enmity and the Mexican, Don Vasquez.
Briefly the owner of the Half-Moon reported the information Nails had gleaned at Tolopah and then told him of the opinions he and the proprietor of the Three Stars had formed. "You got the lay of the land down to the last sage brush," declared the foreman. "But we will put a crimp in Megget's plans that he will not forget.
"Too near," assented Mr. Wilder. "But Megget's men will suffer for this trick, never fear." "They'll sure be surprised when they see us," chimed in the owner of the Three Stars. "That's just it," returned Mr. Wilder. "Of course, they think we have perished in the flames, and when they see us riding in on them they will be so scared it will take all the fight out of them."
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