“There’s a little ginger left in me, pards,” murmured Darrel, sitting up. “I’m not letting a busted wing put me down and out entirely.”
He got up slowly and stood beside Ballard.
“You’re to ride behind me, old man,” said Merriwell. “I’ll mount, Pink, and then you help him up.”
Frank swung into the saddle, pulled the restive Borak down sharply, and kicked a foot out of the stirrup for Darrel’s use. Darrel was game, if ever a boy was. With a little aid from Ballard, he succeeded in getting astride the horse, and held himself there with his right arm around Merriwell.
“Can you hang on, Darrel?” asked Frank.
“Sure,” was the reply. “Just hurry, that’s all.”
With a shouted request for Ballard to follow, Frank headed Borak down the gulch. Five miles lay between Tinaja Wells and the ranch at the mouth of the cañon known as Dolliver’s. There was no horse in that part of the country that could cover the ground more speedily than Borak. Knowing that the ride was plain torture for Darrel, Frank sought to get it over with as quickly as possible.
Although the broken arm swung cruelly during the rough ride, yet never once did so much as a whimper escape Darrel’s lips. In less than half an hour the treacherous trail was covered, and Frank drew up in front of the ranch building. Both Dolliver and Clancy were in front to receive the injured lad. It was well that theywere there, and ready, for no sooner had Borak been drawn to a halt than Darrel pitched sideways from his back. He was caught in the outstretched arms of the rancher and Clancy, and swiftly borne into the house.
Ballard came up, a moment later, and he and Frank dismounted, secured their horses at the hitching post, and went in to learn what luck Clancy had had with his telephoning.
“The doctor’s on the way, Chip,” said Clancy. “I got Mr. Bradlaugh right off the reel. He said he knew the doctor was in town, and that he would be snatching him toward Dolliver’s in less than five minutes. That wasn’t so very long ago, though. You must have ridden like blazes to get here so quick.”
The agony of the rapid ride down the gulch must have been intense for Darrel. He had kept himself in hand pretty well until reaching Dolliver’s, and then a wave of weakness had blotted out his endurance.
A bed in the main room of the ranch was ready for him, and he was now lying in it, as comfortable as he could possibly be under the circumstances.
“I’m putting you fellows to a heap of trouble,” remarked Darrel weakly.
“Oh, bother that!” answered Merry. “It’s mighty good to know that you’ve come off with only a broken arm. You’ll not be laid up long, old man.”
“I’m wondering how that rope happened to give way. It——”
“Don’t wonder about a blooming thing, Darrel. Wait till you feel better.”
“I can’t get it out of my mind,” persisted Darrel. “Where did it break? Did you see?”
“It broke in the place where you had it looped around the paloverde,” said Ballard.
“Strike me lucky!” muttered Darrel, a puzzled look battling with the pain in his face. “Why, it couldn’t have broken there! That rope was Clan’s reata, and was as sound as any rope you ever saw.”
“That’s what happened, anyhow,” said Frank.
“I’m blamed if I can understand it!”
Frank and the other two were also at a loss to understand it. There was certainly something queer about the breaking of that rope.
A little later, the hum of a motor car was heard along the trail.
“Mr. Bradlaugh has come over the road for a record,” remarked Clancy, starting for the door. “But I knew he’d hit ’er up.”
When the boys reached the front of the house, the big car was just slowing to a halt.
“Nothing but a broken arm, eh, boys?” asked Mr. Bradlaugh, as the doctor tumbled out with his surgical case.
“That’s all, sir,” Frank answered.
“I didn’t catch the name over the phone. Whose arm was it? Not Hannibal’s?”
“No, Darrel’s.”
Bradlaugh’s face suddenly clouded.
“That young rascal, eh?” he muttered.
Frank was quick to catch the significance of Mr. Bradlaugh’s remark.
“You know something about Ellis Darrel, Mr. Bradlaugh?” he asked.
“I know that his uncle made a home for him, treated him indulgently in every way, and that he rewarded Hawtrey by forging his name to pay a gambling debt. I was sorry to hear that you’d taken up with the fellow, Merriwell, or that you were making room for him in the Ophir camp. He’s a wild one, and won’t do any of you much good.”
Here was an impression which Frank was determined to change for one of another sort. While Clancy and Ballard were helping the doctor set the broken arm, and while an occasional groan of pain echoed out through the open ranch door, Frank leaned against the side of the car and earnestly explained a few things to Mr. Bradlaugh.
He went into the details of that thousand-dollar robbery, just as he had done once before for the benefit of Colonel Hawtrey, and by the time he had finished his defense of Darrel, Mr. Bradlaugh was almost convinced that he had made a wrong estimate of “the boy from Nowhere.”
“Well, well,” smiled the president of the Ophir Athletic Club, “you’re a red-hot champion of Darrel’s anyhow. If you’re so positive that the boy has been a victim of some designing scoundrel, I can’t help but think there may be some mistake about that forgery matter. Hawtrey’s a very wealthy man, and the only ones he can leave his property to are Jode Lenning and Ellis Darrel. If Darrel is out of it, then it all goes to Lenning. There’s a point that demands consideration. I don’t know much about Lenning except that he’s a pretty good sprinter, and seems to be the apple of the colonel’s eye—now that Darrel appears to have gone to the bad. If you think you’re doing the right thing by taking up with Darrel, all right. I’m willing to trust to your judgment. And now, tell me, how’s everything at Tinaja Wells?”
“Fine as silk,” Frank answered. “This accident of Darrel’s is the first one we’ve had.”
“How did it happen?”
Frank recounted the details, in a general way, putting himself very much in the background.
“Own up,” smiled Mr. Bradlaugh; “you’re the one who picked Darrel off the shelf, and kept him from breaking his neck as well as his arm. Isn’t that the size of it?”
Merriwell dodged the question as well as he could, and began telling about Hawtrey’s visit to the camp, and his proposals. Mr. Bradlaugh was in hearty agreement with the colonel.
“It’s up to you, boys,” said he, “to wipe out this bitterness between the two clubs while you are out in the hills in neighboring camps. If that’s accomplished, it will be something worth while. Remember, too, all Ophir is counting on you to give us a winning eleven for the game with Gold Hill.”
“I’ll do my best,” Frank answered. “Won’t you come in, Mr. Bradlaugh, and meet Darrel?”
“He’s probably in no condition to make acquaintances now,” answered Mr. Bradlaugh, shaking his head; “and, besides,” he added, “I’d a good deal rather shake hands with him after you prove he’s innocent of forging his uncle’s name.”
In an hour, the doctor’s work was finished. The broken arm had been set and bandaged with splints, and there was an odor of drugs around Dolliver’s and much relief and satisfaction in the minds of Frank and his chums. There were no internal injuries, so far as the doctor could see, and, in a month or so, Darrel was promised that he should be as well as ever.
It was growing dark, by that time, and, as Frank knew the lads at the camp would be wondering over the absence of most of those left on guard duty, he and Clancy started back to Tinaja Wells shortly after Mr. Bradlaugh hadwhirled away toward town with the doctor. Ballard was to remain behind and look after Darrel.
It was eight o’clock when Merriwell and Clancy rode up on the flat and got wearily down from their horses. As Silva hurried up and took the mounts, a throng of lads surrounded the latecomers.
“Where the dickens have you fellows been?” demanded Hannibal Bradlaugh. “Fritz has been howling his Dutch head off trying to get you to come to supper. And that was all of two hours ago. The last seen of you, you were on your way down the cañon to help Clancy and Ballard get that football that Silva had kicked over the cliff. Some of us went down there looking for you, but all we could find was a rope hanging from a stunted tree on the cliffside. It was the biggest kind of a mystery. And it only got deeper and deeper when Silva discovered that mounts belonging to you, Ballard and Clancy had vanished from the herd. Come across with the news, Chip. We’re all of us on tenterhooks.”
“Can’t we eat while we’re palavering?” wailed Clancy. “I feel as though I hadn’t hit a grub layout for a week.”
“Come on mit yoursellufs,” said Fritz, “und haf a leedle someding vich I peen keeping hot. Dit you get der pall?”
“Hang the ball!” answered Clancy, “we’ve had something else to think of.”
While they ate, the two chums told of the accident to Darrel, and how they had taken him to Dolliver’s and left him there with Ballard. There was general regret expressed on every hand, for Darrel, greeted with distrust when he had first reached the camp, was fast becoming a prime favorite.
“While we were hiking back down the cañon,” said Handy,“we met Hawtrey. We talked with him for a spell, and he batted up that proposition of competing in a friendly way with the Gold Hillers. He said you favored it. When we reached camp we found Lenning and Bleeker, from Camp Hawtrey, waiting for us. They proposed a football game for to-morrow afternoon, and I took them on for two fifteen minutes of play. Didn’t think it best to tire the boys for a full game. I reckon, though, that I’d better send over to their camp and call it off.”
“Don’t you do it, Handy,” protested Merriwell. “Let ’em come. I’m particularly anxious to get better acquainted with Jode Lenning.”
Handy and Brad studied Frank’s face earnestly, for a minute, and then they both chuckled.
“I see your signal smoke, Chip,” grinned Handy. “You’re thinking of Darrel. All right, we’ll let them come; and I hope something happens, during the set-to, that will be of some benefit to Curly.”