The Return of the Mucker, Edgar Rice Burroughs [best affordable ebook reader txt] 📗

but was eminently qualified to expend ammunition without wasting it.

Rozales and his small band halted out of range of the ranch; but they went hungry while their quarry fed themselves and their tired mounts.

The Clark brothers and their cousin, a man by the name of Mason, who were the sole inhabitants of the ranch counseled a long rest—two hours at least, for the border was still ten miles away and speed at the last moment might be their sole means of salvation.

Billy was for moving on at once before the reinforcements, for which he was sure Rozales had dispatched his messenger, could overtake them. But the others were tired and argued, too, that upon jaded ponies they could not hope to escape and so they waited, until, just as they were ready to continue their flight, flight became impossible.

Darkness had fallen when the little party commenced to resaddle their ponies and in the midst of their labors there came a rude and disheartening interruption. Billy had kept either the Chinaman or Bridge constantly upon watch toward the direction in which Rozales’ men lolled smoking in the dark, and it was the crack of Bridge’s carbine which awoke the Americans to the fact that though the border lay but a few miles away they were still far from safety.

As he fired Bridge turned in his saddle and shouted to the others to make for the shelter of the ranchhouse.

“There are two hundred of them,” he cried. “Run for cover!”

Billy and the Clark brothers leaped to their saddles and spurred toward the point where Bridge sat pumping lead into the advancing enemy. Mason and Mr. Harding hurried Barbara to the questionable safety of the ranchhouse. The Mexican followed them, and Bridge ordered Sing back to assist in barricading the doors and windows, while he and Billy and the Clark boys held the bandits in momentary check.

Falling back slowly and firing constantly as they came the four approached the house while Pesita and his full band advanced cautiously after them. They had almost reached the house when Bridge lunged forward from his saddle. The Clark boys had dismounted and were leading their ponies inside the house. Billy alone noted the wounding of his friend. Without an instant’s hesitation he slipped from his saddle, ran back to where Bridge lay and lifted him in his arms. Bullets were pattering thick about them. A horseman far in advance of his fellows galloped forward with drawn saber to cut down the gringos.

Billy, casting an occasional glance behind, saw the danger in time to meet it—just, in fact, as the weapon was cutting through the air toward his head. Dropping Bridge and dodging to one side he managed to escape the cut, and before the swordsman could recover Billy had leaped to his pony’s side and seizing the rider about the waist dragged him to the ground.

“Rozales!” he exclaimed, and struck the man as he had never struck another in all his life, with the full force of his mighty muscles backed by his great weight, with clenched fist full in the face.

There was a spurting of blood and a splintering of bone, and Captain Guillermo Rozales sank senseless to the ground, his career of crime and rapine ended forever.

Again Billy lifted Bridge in his arms and this time he succeeded in reaching the ranchhouse without opposition though a little crimson stream trickled down his left arm to drop upon the face of his friend as he deposited Bridge upon the floor of the house.

All night the Pesitistas circled the lone ranchhouse. All night they poured their volleys into the adobe walls and through the barricaded windows. All night the little band of defenders fought gallantly for their lives; but as day approached the futility of their endeavors was borne in upon them, for of the nine one was dead and three wounded, and the numbers of their assailants seemed undiminished.

Billy Byrne had been lying all night upon his stomach before a window firing out into the darkness at the dim forms which occasionally showed against the dull, dead background of the moonless desert.

Presently he leaped to his feet and crossed the floor to the room in which the horses had been placed.

“Everybody fire toward the rear of the house as fast as they can,” said Billy. “I want a clear space for my getaway.”

“Where you goin?” asked one of the Clark brothers.

“North,” replied Billy, “after some of Funston’s men on the border.”

“But they won’t cross,” said Mr. Harding. “Washington won’t let them.”

“They gotta,” snapped Billy Byrne, “an’ they will when they know there’s an American girl here with a bunch of Dagos yappin’ around.”

“You’ll be killed,” said Price Clark. “You can’t never get through.”

“Leave it to me,” replied Billy. “Just get ready an’ open that back door when I give the word, an’ then shut it again in a hurry when I’ve gone through.”

He led a horse from the side room, and mounted it.

“Open her up, boes!” he shouted, and “S’long everybody!”

Price Clark swung the door open. Billy put spurs to his mount and threw himself forward flat against the animal’s neck. Another moment he was through and a rattling fusillade of shots proclaimed the fact that his bold feat had not gone unnoted by the foe.

The little Mexican pony shot like a bolt from a crossbow out across the level desert. The rattling of carbines only served to add speed to its frightened feet. Billy sat erect in the saddle, guiding the horse with his left hand and working his revolver methodically with his right.

At a window behind him Barbara Harding stood breathless and spellbound until he had disappeared into the gloom of the early morning darkness to the north, then she turned with a weary sigh and resumed her place beside the wounded Bridge whose head she bathed with cool water, while he tossed in the delirium of fever.

The first streaks of daylight were piercing the heavens, the Pesitistas were rallying for a decisive charge, the hopes of the little band of besieged were at low ebb when from the west there sounded the pounding of many hoofs.

“Villa,” moaned Westcott Clark, hopelessly. “We’re done for now, sure enough. He must be comin’ back from his raid on the border.”

In the faint light of dawn they saw a column of horsemen deploy suddenly into a long, thin line which galloped forward over the flat earth, coming toward them like a huge, relentless engine of destruction.

The Pesitistas were watching too. They had ceased firing and sat in their saddles forgetful of their contemplated charge.

The occupants of the ranchhouse were gathered at the small windows.

“What’s them?” cried Mason—“them things floating over ‘em.”

“They’re guidons!” exclaimed Price Clark “—the guidons of the United States cavalry regiment. See ‘em! See ‘em? God! but don’t they look good?”

There was a wild whoop from the lungs of the advancing cavalrymen. Pesita’s troops answered it with a scattering volley, and a moment later the Americans were among them in that famous revolver charge which is now history.

Daylight had come revealing to the watchers in the ranchhouse the figures of the combatants. In the thick of the fight loomed the giant figure of a man in nondescript garb which more closely resembled the apparel of the Pesitistas than it did the uniforms of the American soldiery, yet it was with them he fought. Barbara’s eyes were the first to detect him.

“There’s Mr. Byrne,” she cried. “It must have been he who brought the troops.”

“Why, he hasn’t had time to reach the border yet,” remonstrated one of the Clark boys, “much less get back here with help.”

“There he is though,” said Mr. Harding. “It’s certainly strange. I can’t understand what American troops are doing across the border—especially under the present administration.”

The Pesitistas held their ground for but a moment then they wheeled and fled; but not before Pesita himself had forced his pony close to that of Billy Byrne.

“Traitor!” screamed the bandit. “You shall die for this,” and fired point-blank at the American.

Billy felt a burning sensation in his already wounded left arm; but his right was still good.

“For poor, bleeding Mexico!” he cried, and put a bullet through Pesita’s forehead.

Under escort of the men of the Thirteenth Cavalry who had pursued Villa’s raiders into Mexico and upon whom Billy Byrne had stumbled by chance, the little party of fugitives came safely to United States soil, where all but one breathed sighs of heartfelt relief.

Bridge was given first aid by members of the hospital corps, who assured Billy that his friend would not die. Mr. Harding and Barbara were taken in by the wife of an officer, and it was at the quarters of the latter that Billy Byrne found her alone in the sitting-room.

The girl looked up as he entered, a sad smile upon her face. She was about to ask him of his wound; but he gave her no opportunity.

“I’ve come for you,” he said. “I gave you up once when I thought it was better for you to marry a man in your own class. I won’t give you up again. You’re mine—you’re my girl, and I’m goin’ to take you with me. Were goin’ to Galveston as fast as we can, and from there we’re goin’ to Rio. You belonged to me long before Bridge saw you. He can’t have you. Nobody can have you but me, and if anyone tries to keep me from taking you they’ll get killed.”

He took a step nearer that brought him close to her. She did not shrink—only looked up into his face with wide eyes filled with wonder. He seized her roughly in his arms.

“You are my girl!” he cried hoarsely. “Kiss me!”

“Wait!” she said. “First tell me what you meant by saying that Bridge couldn’t have me. I never knew that Bridge wanted me, and I certainly have never wanted Bridge. O Billy! Why didn’t you do this long ago? Months ago in New York I wanted you to take me; but you left me to another man whom I didn’t love. I thought you had ceased to care, Billy, and since we have been together here—since that night in the room back of the office—you have made me feel that I was nothing to you. Take me, Billy! Take me anywhere in the world that you go. I love you and I’ll slave for you—anything just to be with you.”

“Barbara!” cried Billy Byrne, and then his voice was smothered by the pressure of warm, red lips against his own.

A half hour later Billy stepped out into the street to make his way to the railroad station that he might procure transportation for three to Galveston. Anthony Harding was going with them. He had listened to Barbara’s pleas, and had finally volunteered to back Billy Byrne’s flight from the jurisdiction of the law, or at least to a place where, under a new name, he could start life over again and live it as the son-in-law of old Anthony Harding should live.

Among the crowd viewing the havoc wrought by the raiders the previous night was a large man with a red face. It happened that he turned suddenly about as Billy Byrne was on the point of passing behind him. Both men started as recognition lighted their faces and he of the red face found himself looking down the barrel of a sixshooter.

“Put it up, Byrne,” he admonished the other coolly. “I didn’t know you were so good on the draw.”

“I’m good on the draw all right, Flannagan,” said Billy, “and I ain’t drawin’ for amusement neither. I gotta chance to get away and live straight, and have