As the three boys stood staring in the gathering gloom at the plane that was taking young Arthur Gordon to safety, something dropped at Jim’s feet and mechanically he picked it up. It was a note weighted with a hunk of ice. “Thanks for the buggy ride. A. G. Jr.” He read it aloud, then gave a little grunt of disgust.

“Great boy, that. He’s as lovable as a meat ax,” Bob remarked. A prolonged silence followed as the group glanced anxiously about them. The explosion had spent itself, the air was cleared but the ground was covered as far as they could see with the debris that had been thrown up. Kramer, who had fallen, struggled to his feet, staggered forward, but by that time the sound of the stolen plane died away in the distance.

“We’d better see how badly you are hurt,” Jim announced practically.

68 “Oh, I’ll be all right.”

“We’ll make sure. Bob’s a whiz at first aid, his mother taught him. Have you got any bandaging or stuff like that, Carl?”

“Had a kit,” Summers replied ruefully as his eyes rested on his destroyed quarters, “but I calculate there isn’t much of anything left.”

“Who do you suppose started that thing?” Kramer asked weakly. He wavered a bit and Caldwell sprang to support him. “Was it the Indian?”

“I don’t know, but I imagine it was the lad who stole the plane,” Bob answered. “Come along to the bunk house. Wish one of you fellows would make a fire. There’s an old stove in there. Rustle around and find a kettle or something so I can heat some water.” They prepared to obey the commanding officer and presently they had Kramer on one of the bunks, but there wasn’t any sort of cover to put over him. Jim ran out and gathered an arm full of wood, there was plenty of that scattered around, and it didn’t take him long to get things ready. Carl found an old pail, but it leaked, so he filled it with clean snow and69 rummaged further.

“Who’s got a match?” Jim asked. “I haven’t.”

“Neither have I,” Bob added.

“I had some in the roothouse—”

“Feel around in my pockets, Buddy. I guess you’ll find a few in a folder.” The folder was located but there were only two left.

“Here’s the whole stock.” Bob handed it to his step-brother, who promptly whittled a good collection of shavings to make doubly sure he got his fire. When he struck the first one it crackled like a firecracker and was useless. The four watched as the boy cautiously scratched the last one. After several futile attempts it lighted successfully, a piece of shaving caught, flickered an instant then blazed up and lighted other bits. They sighed with relief at the performance.

“What next, Doctor?” Jim grinned.

“See if you can find some kind of pail or pot, to heat some water in. How many snivel dusters have you got? My patient is bleeding.” Two clean handkerchiefs were produced, then leaving the patient and his attendant, Carl and Jim started to forage for70 a container. After a five minute search they found a pot which was serviceable, then they filled it with snow and took it in to melt.

“Couldn’t you get any water?” Bob demanded.

“No,” Jim answered.

Kramer was partly stripped and the boy found that he had been shot in the shoulder. “Don’t know how bad it is, but I can tie it up for a little while, then we have to find a way to get out. See what you can do.” He went back to his task, and the two assistants watched his capable fingers making a temporary dressing for the wound.

“It’s getting pretty dark. Let’s take some dry wood for torches, then investigate,” Jim proposed. He selected one of the longest pieces from the pile on the floor, lighted the end, and again the two sallied forth.

“Great guns, Jim, suppose we all had been in that place when that thing went off. We’d have been scattered over the landscape.”

“In small chunks,” Jim supplemented. “The sheriff told us that you tapped the wires and reported to him. Suppose we do that now. We can call K-A, his office and get71 a doctor here, or something like that. I didn’t do any extra gabbing about Kramer, but I know Bob, and I have a hunch that the chap has been hurt pretty seriously and needs help quick.”

“A part of the instrument is in the shed, we can get it and try, but I did the tapping in my dugout and that’s blown to blazes,” Carl answered. They were making their way to the shed, and Jim frowned at the information.

“There’s a telephone, or several of them in the house—”

“Sure, but the root-house was between that and Crofton so if the wires are broken we are out of luck unless we can find an end.” A few minutes later Carl found the instrument, and the pair went on to the scene of the disaster. They picked up several sections of dry wood to use when they needed more torches. Holding the light high the boys stopped at what had once been the entrance to Summers’ quarters but now it looked more like a hole that had been shelled with a big gun. From one end to the other they couldn’t see a thing that wasn’t badly broken, or wedged so tightly it was immovable.72 The iron cot was a twisted mass of metal, some of the larger sections of planking stuck up out of the accumulation of earth which had dropped back, and near by they discovered a piece of ski too short to be of any use.

“You hold the light and I’ll feel around,” Jim suggested. “Where abouts was the place you tapped?”

“On the right side of the door. A long time ago someone who owned the ranch had all the wires put in cables underground. It’s a great way to have them but if you don’t know how they are placed it’s some job to locate them,” Carl explained.

“Yes, I know. The only telegraph poles go along the back of the K-A, so they won’t help us. Can you get into the house?”

“Sure, I’ve got the keys—no I haven’t. I left them here on the shelf in a jar this morning. Thought I wouldn’t take a chance on losing them and they are kind of awkward to carry around,” Carl answered. “Whoever set this off surely got us where they want us.”

“We’d better break in somehow. You are an officer of the law, so you have a right to73 do that in an emergency. Come along and we’ll see how things are inside. My family will be throwing fits about now, especially if the bang of that blow-up carried so far,” Jim urged. They hurried toward the old ranch house and presently were standing on the long, low veranda. Their first try was to find out if there were any of the windows which had been left unfastened, but they were all nailed tightly.

“Here goes.” Carl smashed one of the larger panes with a piece of the torch wood they carried, then he ripped out the cross sections, and in a few minutes they were standing in what had been the family living room. Considering the haste the owners had been forced to make when they took their departure, the place was almost bare.

“How do you account for this?” Jim asked in surprise.

“Can’t really. I’ve never been in here, not since I came up to keep watch. The sheriff told me not to unless it was necessary. He said the house had been locked just as they found it and not to disturb anything,” answered Carl. “Expect Arthur Gordon has been hanging around and got away with the74 stuff. Great Scott, I’m some watchman.”

The same depleted state existed everywhere they investigated and as they walked from room to room their footsteps echoed hollowly. Carefully they both watched for telephone instruments and at last they found one in the long hall which went from one end of the building to the other but after examining it they learned that it was merely a house phone that was not used for outside purposes at all.

“That’s that! I know there was a phone in this room,” Jim declared suddenly making his way back to the living room. He remembered the day he had been in Don Haurea’s laboratory and had sat before the television-radio watching and listening to the two Gordons. That time the phone had rung and the young man talked over it. Without the furnishings it was not easy to locate where the instrument had stood, so they lighted a second torch and painstakingly examined the floor.

“Isn’t that a hole?” Carl pointed to the floor and sure enough they found an opening large enough to permit wires or a cable to go through, but there wasn’t even an inch75 of one left.

“It must go into the cellar,” Jim announced. He stood a moment to get the position, then they searched for the trap door through which they followed the stone steps down to the cave-like basement. It too had been systematically cleaned out. There wasn’t a useful thing in the place. It took a few minutes to find the hole that went into the living room above, but there was nothing left of the telephone.

“Wonder why in heck he ripped them up!” Carl exploded. “What did he expect to do with them?”

“Search me,” answered Jim. “I say, this place surely is spooky.”

“Let’s get out,” urged Carl. “Think it’s all right to leave Bob and Kramer alone?” he added.

“We’re here, so we’d better have another look for some wires,” Jim insisted. “We’ve simply got to get into connection with somebody soon.” Later they found the place where the cable went through the masonry but everything had been ripped away, and there was no possible means of getting at the connections that had once been there.

76 “We’re dished at this end. If I had been above the house I’d have discovered that these things were out of commission. Perhaps that’s why Gordon blew up the root-house,” volunteered the deputy.

“Think he did it?” asked Jim softly. The mystery of the place was beginning to get on his nerves. An almost overwhelming sense of helplessness was taking possession of him, but he struggled to combat it.

“Who else would? I don’t believe it was Jute. I’ve known him since I was a kid. He gave me my first pair of pigeons—they were beauties,” Carl answered.

“How did he happen to come around here?”

“I don’t know that, but I think he was following his traps and discovered I was guarding the place. He thought he’d have a little fun with me, so he made the tracks, but he just walked in on me this morning. I sure was glad to see him, and he laughed when I told him how he got my nanny with his trick. If he had done any mischief around the place he would have sneaked off and no one would have been the wiser. Let’s go and see if the doc and Kramer are all right.”

77 “Yes, then we’ll get to work on the dugout. We ought to be able to get connected with some wires there unless they are buried too tightly under that mound. I saw some tools in the shed, we can dig and chop.” They were glad to get out of the house and later when they reached the “hospital” Bob greeted them cheerfully.

“My patient is comfortable,” he announced with a grin. “Able to do anything?”

“Not yet, but we’ll try something else. Got plenty of wood? We may be gone an hour or so,” explained Jim.

“Lots. I discovered a box full, so we’ll be comfortable.” Kramer was lying on the bed, but his eyes were closed and he did not move.

“Asleep?” Summers wanted to know.

“Yes, just dozed off. If you find anything to eat, bring it along.”

“Sure pop. I say, Bob, are those guns you have, loaded?” Jim asked.

“To the gills,” the young fellow replied.

“Well, you keep them handy—”

“Shoot first and apologize afterwards,” Carl advised.

“The door is a good solid one and it has a78 bar across,” Bob told them so they realized that his labors had not made him forget to be cautious.

“So long. Meet you in the olive grove.” The two went out again and in the shed they found a couple of hatchets, a spade, and a short handled pick, which they took with them to the hole and immediately set to work to locate a weak spot in the mass. Necessity made them search thoroughly and at last they were rewarded by discovering a place where some of the beams had only a few inches of covering, which Jim industriously shoveled out of the way while Carl held the torch.

“Here she comes,” Austin exclaimed with satisfaction. Summers stuck the light in the ground, the two hauled on the boards and presently had a good sized opening.

“It lets us in toward where the door was,” Carl announced and he let himself down. “I say, Old Timer, you light another torch; we’d better each have one so we can see our way and not stumble over each other.”

“Rip snorting idea. Gosh all fishhooks, I’m hungry.”

“There is some grub. You look at the far79 end, you’ll find a sort of cache I made near the partition. I’ll see if I can get at the wires.” They started on the task but the debris cluttered the root-house so they were forced to proceed slowly, and several times they helped each other lift pieces of logs and rocks out of the way. Finally they were busy at their respective ends, Carl looking for exposed wires, and Jim trying to find some food that had escaped destruction. He had to do more chopping and hammering and, after several minutes he succeeded in clearing a wide section of the partition, but he didn’t locate the cache, so he went to work again, stopping once to kindle a fresh torch, and with its bright light he discovered that he had come through the dug-out to the second cellar.

“Having any luck?” Carl shouted.

“Not much,” he answered. “How about you?”

“I think I’ll have it in a minute,” replied Carl and he began to chop away, while Jim at the opposite end stepped into one of the older sections. Like the front of the place this too was wrecked, but not quite so badly as there had not been such a variety of80 things to scatter. However, one side was inaccessible, and although Jim saw nothing of special note on the other, he decided to examine it anyway. One thing which attracted his attention was a quantity of paper which looked as if some big books had been torn to bits, and some of their pages burned. Curious, Austin picked up some pieces, wondering from where they had come, then he found out, for right in front of him was an opening. Beyond the boy was a very small room which seemed to be lined with some sort of masonry. It was about seven feet square, and had projections which might have been used for shelves and seats. On the floor was more of the paper, like that which he had picked up outside, but in the poor light the boy could not be sure if it was blank or not.

“A queer joint,” he muttered, but a closer examination revealed nothing more, and there was no explanation as to why the small room was there or for what it had been used. The torch was beginning to burn close to his hand, so he made his way out. They could explore it later.

“Hey, Jim, I got it. Whoopee!”

81 “Good work.” Jim stuffed a few bits of the paper into his pocket and hurried to see what Summers had accomplished. He found that the deputy had unearthed a wire, had attached his instrument, and was listening for a response to his call. At last it came, then after a moment’s delay, Carl began to put in his message.

“I say, Sheriff, Arthur Gordon, the young fellow, was here. He got away in the Austin’s airplane—” There was a pause. “He blew up the place, but we’re all right, except Kramer, he was shot—” Another pause then Carl looked at Jim. “He wants to know how much gas was in the plane, how far it could go.” Austin frowned and thought hard, then he remembered that as he sat in the cock-pit with the pilot he had calculated that there wasn’t enough to carry them more than about sixty miles.

“Not much unless there was a reserve tank, and I don’t believe there was,” he answered. “We can find out for sure from Kramer, if he is able to talk.”

“Only a little.” Then followed a series of quick questions and answers, and finally Carl disconnected with a sigh of relief.82 “They discovered at Crofton that they can’t get the ranches up Cap Rock on the telephone and some line men are out looking for the trouble. Your father sent a message through from the Haurea place, sent it to the north station, and it was relayed back. They wanted to know what had happened to us.”

“I suppose our folks are on their way down,” Jim remarked, and he was mighty glad.

“Sure thing. The sheriff is going to broadcast about Gordon and have every plane watched. Too bad it wasn’t earlier in the day, but the landing field will turn on the search lights. It isn’t a dark night and if he has to come down for gas he’ll run the risk of getting picked up.” Carl put the instrument in the spacious pockets and they felt he had done a good job.

“I didn’t find a blame thing to eat, but I guess we can survive until someone comes. Say, Summers, I opened a queer hole, come and look at it,” Jim urged, so he led the way back to the paper-strewn section. They crawled through the opening and Carl stared in puzzled wonder.

83 “Great guns, I never saw a place like this before.” He tapped about the wall, but made no further discovery.

“What do you suppose it is?”

“Tell you what it might be—a hiding place. Before the blow-up, I looked behind those boards and even went into the second division. It was just another place for storing potatoes, or something like that—canned fruit perhaps,” Carl answered.

“What was this metal room used for? Bob’s mother has a closet for preserves in the cellar at the K-A and she has one on the Cross-Bar, but they’re just built-in places to keep things at an even heat, or cool, nothing like this,” Jim explained.

“Sure, I know, my mother has one. Tell you what, this is an old ranch, was settled by some of the first cowmen when the country was pretty wild. It might be that the owner had this in case of a raid, a place big enough to keep his wife and children, something like that—he might have wanted to keep them safe from Indians—”

“It looks to me as if this is about five or six feet below the surface of the ground and84 quite a few people could stay here but not for long,” Jim remarked.

“It would protect anyone who got in, from being butchered, or in case the ranch houses were burned,” Carl suggested.

“Perhaps that was it, but I don’t see why all the paper,” Jim argued.

“Neither do I unless they had books, accounts and that sort of thing. Some of the descendants could have used it as a safe-deposit, but I haven’t got another guess. Come on and see how Bob and Kramer are.”

They didn’t wait to do more than throw a few pieces of plank over the openings, and then with new torches they made their way to the bunk house, which was pitch dark. Jim caught Carl’s arm and instinctively the two stepped as softly as the hard snow would permit. When they reached the door, Austin listened, but not a sound came from inside. He tapped softly, his heart hammering against his ribs, with dread lest some thing had happened to his Flying Buddy and Kramer. He wished heartily that they hadn’t lingered so long.

“Knock again,” Carl whispered and Jim did. There was a soft movement from inside,85 the bar was lifted carefully, and finally the door moved, but only wide enough to permit the barrel of a gun to be poked through.

“Hands up or I’ll blow you up—”

“Buddy—Bob—”

“Oh, why the heck did you come sneaking around like a pair of coyotes? I heard a dozen things since you left. Come on in. Get anything to eat?” The two entered and the younger boy turned up the wick of a small lantern. “Gosh, I thought you fellows had been buried.”

“No, but we got word to the sheriff,” Carl explained. “How’s Kramer?”

“Crazy in the head. He’s been muttering and twisting around until I had to tie him down.” Just then they heard the welcome honk of an automobile, and two minutes later, Mr. Austin and Don Haurea were at the door. “When do we eat?” the substitute doctor demanded.

“Right away, my boy. Your mother knew that you would be hungry—”

“God bless her, she knows we always are,” Caldwell grinned, and the rest of the party laughed heartily.