The Boy Ranchers Among the Indians | Page 2

the sentence for he was nearly thrown from his saddle (something most unusual with him) as his pony gave a sudden leap to one side, following a peculiar noise in a bunch of grass on which the animal almost stepped.
The noise was not unlike that made by a locust in a tree on a hot day, but there was in the vibrations a more sinister sound. And well did Slim's horse know what it indicated.
"A rattler!" yelled Bud, and close on the heels of his words followed action.
He whipped out his .45, there was a sliver of flame, a sharp crack at which the three steeds of the trio of youthful cowboys jumped slightly, and there writhed on the trail a venomous rattle-snake, its head now a shapeless mass where the bullet from Bud's gun had almost obliterated it.
"Whew! A big one!" exclaimed Slim, who had quickly gotten his pony under control again, and turned it back toward the scene of action. It spoke well for his ability that he had not lost his cigarette, and was puffing on it, though the sudden leap of his steed, to avoid a bite that probably would have meant death, had jarred the words from his mouth.
"First of the season," added Bud, slipping his gun back into the holster.
"Are they more poisonous then than at other times?" asked Nort.
"Guess there isn't much difference, son," affirmed Slim. "I don't want to be nipped by one at any time. Much obliged, Bud," he said, easily enough, though there was a world of meaning in his voice. "I shore plum would hate to have to shoot Pinto, and that's what I'd a done if that serpent had set its fangs in his leg."
"Why'd he shoot him?" asked Dick, for he and his brother, though far removed from the tenderfoot class, were not wise to all western ways yet.
"There isn't much chance for a horse after it's been bit deep by a rattler," Bud explained. "Of course I don't say every horse that's bitten will die, but it's harder to doctor them than it is a man. And Slim meant he wouldn't want to see Pinto suffer."
"You're right there, Bud!" drawled Slim Degnan. "They do say this new-fangled treatment is better'n whisky for snake bites, but I don't reckon I want to chance it."
"The permanganate of potash is almost a sure cure for the ordinary snake bite, if you use it in time," declared Bud. "But I don't know that it would work after a fer de lance set his fangs into you. Anyhow I'm glad we haven't anything worse than rattlers and copperheads around here."
"They're bad enough!" affirmed Slim, as he gave a backward glance toward the still writhing form of the big rattler, which was now past all power of doing harm.
The incident seemed to cause the foreman to forget what he had been about to say when his horse shied, and the boy ranchers, by which title is indicated Bud, Nort and Dick, did not attach enough importance to it to cause them to question their companion. Yet what Slim had been about to say was destined to have a great influence on their lives in the immediate future, and was to cause them to ride forward into danger. But then danger was nothing new to them.
"Well, things are right peaceful since we got rid of Del Pinzo and his gang of greasers," observed Slim, as he rode on with the boys down the trail that led to Diamond X ranch, the property of Bud's father.
"But I'm always worrying for fear they'll come back, or we'll have some sort of trouble with our cattle," observed Dick. "It doesn't seem possible that over at our Happy Valley ranch we'll be let alone to do as we please."
"Don't cross a bridge until you hear the rattling of the planks!" paraphrased Nort to his brother. "We're all right so far."
"Yes, things are sittin' right pretty for the present," declared Slim. "Well, here we are," he added, as a turn of the trail brought them within sight of the corrals and other parts of Diamond X ranch. "And there's your folks," he added, as a woman and girl, standing in the yard of a red ranch house, began to wave their hands to the boys.
"I see Dad!" exclaimed End.
"Where?" asked Nort.
"Over by the pony corral, talking to Yellin' Kid. Looks like Kid just came in with the mail."
"He started after it when I rode out to look for a couple of strays," said Slim. "Beckon he jest come back. You boys'll hear more partic'lars now, I reckon."
"Particulars of what?" asked Nort. "Was that what you started to say when Bud shot the rattler?"
Slim did not answer, the reason being that a moment later he was surrounded by a