“No. But we want some of the boys to go
with us. I want to search that old bears’
den, and the gulch there, and all about.”
“Go to it, Honey-bird,” he said, patting
her shoulder. “You shall have Hess and
any other two boys you want. That’s enough
to handle any little tad of Mexicans that may be hanging
about up there. I’ll speak to Hess.
Want to go to-morrow?”
This plan was agreed to. Of course the girls
and Walter did not want to rest after their exciting
experiences at the round-up and afterward.
“All you young people want to do,” Mr.
Hammond declared, “is to keep moving!”
Walter made certain preparations for a search of the
bears’ den. One of the cowpunchers chosen
to accompany the party was a good cook. Hesitation
Kane took a pack horse with more of a camping outfit
than would have been the case had there not been four
girls in the party.
“I don’t see,” drawled Mr. Hammond,
“how you girls manage to travel at all without
a Saratoga trunk apiece. Got your curlin’-tongs,
Rhoda? And be sure and take a lookin’ glass
and white gloves.”
“Now, Daddy! you know you malign me,”
laughed his daughter. “And as for these
other girls, they fuss less than any girls you ever
saw from the East.”
“I don’t know. I’m kind of
sorry for that pack horse,” chuckled her father,
who delighted to plague them.
They might have made the trip to the gulch where the
girls had taken refuge from the tornado and returned
the next day; but they proposed to trail around the
foothills for several days. Indeed, even the
cowboys in the party had become interested once more
in the buried treasure.
“It strikes us about once in so often,”
said the cook, as they started away from the corrals,
“and some of us git bit regular with this treasure-hunting
bug. Long’s we know the treasure is somewhere
hid and there is a chance of finding it, we are bound
to feel that way. Then we waste the boss’s
time and wear ourselves out hunting Lobarto’s
cache. Course, we won’t never find it; but
it is loads of fun.”
“I declare!” cried Rhoda, tossing her
head, “you are just as encouraging, Tom Collins,
as daddy is. I never heard the like!”
THE STAMPEDE
The enthusiasm of the girls and Walter Mason did not
falter, however, no matter how much the older people
scoffed at the idea of the treasure hidden by the
Mexican bandit being found near Rose Ranch. They
went forth from the ranch house with some little expectation
of returning with the plunder.
Hesitation Kane, of course, did not try to discourage
them. Even a buried treasure could not excite
the horse wrangler, in the least.
“I guess an Apache raid would not ruffle Hesitation’s
soul,” Rhoda observed. “He is quite
the calmest person I ever saw.”
Since the tornado the cattle of the main herd of Rose
Ranch had been broken into small bunches and were
feeding in the higher pastures. The swales and
rich arroyos, in which the grass had been so lush,
had been badly drowned out by the flood. It would
be several weeks before the lowlands offered good
pasturage again.
