Jack of the Pony Express - Frank V. Webster (distant reading .txt) 📗

I don't need to tell you what sort of a crime that is! You won't have to deal with me, you'll have to answer to the government, and the inspectors will be on your trail inside of twenty-four hours! Don't you touch that mail!"

For a moment the men did seem impressed by Jack's sharp warning. Then the man on the horse laughed, and said:

"Oh, quit your talking. Go on, take the sacks and we'll get away. We can't stay here the rest of the night!"

"Say, he has a pretty lively tongue," observed the man who was loosening the sacks from Jack's saddle. "He gave me a start for a second or two."

"Forget it! Yank 'em off and come on."

Jack felt that it would be useless to protest further. Besides, there was a growing feeling of sickness and pain. The man took the express and mail packages and tied them on one of the three horses.

"Now then get off, you pony rider!" ordered the man on the big horse. "Get off, and get off quick! We're in a hurry and we're done fooling!"

"What—what are you going to do?" faltered Jack. He was beginning to be afraid of what was to come.

"We're going to tie you up so tight that you won't get loose in a jiffy," was the answer he received. "You say the inspectors will be on our trail inside of twenty-four hours. Well, maybe they won't if you can't get loose to give the alarm. So we're going to tie you up."

"That won't prevent the alarm from being given," Jack said. "When I fail to arrive there'll be a search made, and they'll find me."

"That's right," Jack heard one of the unmounted men say in a low voice.
"He's right about that."

"Oh, what of it?" impatiently asked the man on the horse. "Of course this thing is bound to be found out sooner or later. I expect that. But we can gain a little time by trussing him up with ropes. Now come on—be lively. Get off or I'll yank you off, and I won't be easy about it, either!"

Jack felt it best to obey. He leaped from the Saddle, and then, with a sharp slap on the flank of Sunger, he cried to his pony: "Go on, boy! Home!"

The intelligent animal sprang forward, and before any of the men could catch him had darted off down the dark trail in the direction of Rainbow Ridge.

"Look out—get him!" one of the men cried, sharply.

"What's the use—he's gone, and he's one of the fastest horses in the mountains; we'd never catch him," said the mounted man. "It was a sharp trick, lad, but it won't do you any good. Tie him up!"

Jack was handled roughly by the outlaws, and was soon so tightly bound that he felt he never could get loose without help. He once more tried to look behind one of the masks, but it was so dark that he could see nothing. He tried to get a mental picture of the shapes of the men and the tones of their voices, so he might know them again if he ever saw or heard them.

"Lay him over here, on one side of the road," ordered the man who seemed to be the leader. "Some one may be along before noon to-morrow and take care of you," he said to Jack, who did not answer. "If they don't we'll send an anonymous message, telling where you can be found. We don't want to hurt you, but we had to have this stuff from you, and this was the only way to get it," the outlaw went on. "Come along, boys," he concluded.

Then the four men, taking with them the mail and express pouches, galloped away in the darkness.

CHAPTER X A QUEER DISCOVERY

Left to himself, tied tightly with the ropes that cut into his wrists and made his legs ache, poor Jack lay in a sort of stupor. He could hardly understand what had happened, and his head hurt him very much where he had been struck. He was lying on the road at one side of the trail. Overhead he could see the stars twinkling. It was still very quiet.

"Not much chance of any one coming along the trail to-night," mused Jack. It was the first thought that had come clearly to him, and, in a measure, it served to rouse him from his stupor. Then his brain seemed to clear.

"I've got to do something! I can't lie here and wait for some one to come and help me!" he decided, Already there was more vigor in the activity of his mind.

Jack's first idea, as soon as he had begun to think clearly, was that he must loosen his bonds. To this end he writhed and struggled as he lay on his back. He managed to roll over on his side, but he found himself more uncomfortable than in his first position, and soon rolled back to that.

During this operation he tried, by every means in his power, to stretch or strain the knots. He thought if he could only get one of the bonds to give he might manage to get one hand out.

"And if I can do that, I'll soon be clear," Jack reasoned, "But it isn't going to be easy to get one hand out."

It did not take him long to discover this. The robbers had done their work well. They were taking no chances. Jack rested after his struggles. His head ached worse than ever because of the rush of blood to it from the strain.

"I wonder if it will do any good to call?" he mused. "I'm going to try. But
I've got to get my breath first."

A little later he began shouting and calling for help, doing it at intervals. But he had not much hope. He was on the lonesomest part of the trail, which, at best, was seldom traveled. Often days would pass without any one, save the pony express rider, going over the mountain.

"I might as well save my breath, I guess," reasoned Jack. "This is only playing me out. Maybe they'll come for me when Sunger gets home. Whoever sees him without me and the mail will know something has happened. The only trouble is they won't know where to look. But it's my best chance, I think."

He lay quiet for a period, thinking over the momentous events that had just occurred.

"I wonder who those men were, and what they were after," mused Jack. "There wasn't enough valuable stuff in the express packages to make four men risk state's prison for it. It must have been the mail they were after. And nothing of great value was in the mail, except the letters for Mr. Argent. Of course, they were what they wanted. And in that case he ought to know who would be most interested in taking them. We may be able to arrest the men yet.

"But it may be too late," Jack reflected. "They may get the information they want and take the secret mine away from those to whom it belongs. That would be too bad! But if my plan only works, and those fellows don't open that bundle of papers, the letters may be safe yet. It was my best chance. If I could only get loose!"

Again Jack struggled and squirmed, but the ropes would not give an inch. Suddenly, as the young pony express rider was trying to work loose his bonds, he felt a sharp pain in one hand, which was under him, behind his back, pressing on the earth.

"Whew! Something cut me then!" Jack exclaimed. "Must be a knife one of the men dropped. If I could only get at that and on a rope!"

Carefully he felt along on the ground, so as not to cut himself again. His fingers touched something sharp.

"A piece of glass—part of a broken bottle," he murmured. "Well, it may be as good as a knife, but I'll probably cut myself more in using it."

He managed to work himself down until he had a firm grip on the piece of glass under him—a grip that did not cut.

"Now let me figure this out," he mused.

It was obvious that he could not hold the piece of glass in his fingers and saw away at the ropes around his wrists. He could not bend his fingers back far enough.

"If I could only get the glass between my feet, I might be able to bend them back far enough, by lying on my face, so I could saw on the ropes that way," he reflected. He tried, but soon had to give it up. He also endeavored to do this by lying on his side, but it was of no use. Then, in a flash, it came to him.

"I'll bury the glass in the ground, to hold it," he told himself. "By leaving a sharp, jagged edge sticking out I ought to be able to saw through the ropes on my wrists, by rubbing the cords up and down against the glass. I'll do it!"

It was hard work, but by lying on his side Jack managed, after a fashion. He had to work without seeing what he was doing. Even daylight would not have helped him, for he could not see behind his back.

By using the glass as a sort of shovel, Jack managed to dig a hole in the earth. He then put the long piece of glass in this, upright, and packed dirt around it. His fingers came in contact with a small stone, and he used this to tamp the soil and gravel around the glass knife, to hold it more firmly upright. He cut himself several times while doing this, but he kept on.

Finally he was ready to make the attempt. It was more than an hour after he first began his operations, and he was weary, for he had to work in a cramped and uncomfortable position. He rested a few minutes, and then began sawing the rope around his wrists up and down on the sharp piece of glass stuck upright in the ground.

It had to be done slowly and gently, because too much pressure would have overturned the queer knife. Jack knew he must be patient. He cut his wrists more than once, but the gashes were slight, and he thought the bleeding would soon stop.

Finally he felt the bonds loosening slightly. Some of the rope strands were cut through.

"It won't be long now," Jack thought, gladly.

Again and again on the jagged edge of the glass knife did he rub the cords, and finally, with a sudden spreading apart of his hands, he found he could break the remaining strands.

His hands were free!

Jack's heart beat high with hope now. He waited a few minutes to let the slackened circulation of blood take up its work. Then it was the work of but an instant, with the same piece of glass that had served him so well, to sever the ropes about his legs. But when Jack tried to stand up he nearly toppled over, so weak was he, and so numb were his legs. They had gone to sleep from the lack of circulation of the blood.

But in a little while he was all right, and could walk about.

"Now, the question is, what's the best thing to do?" he asked himself. "Make for home, as soon as I can, and give the alarm," he reasoned. "I've got to give the alarm, if Sunger hasn't already gotten there and given it for me."

Off on the dark and lonely trail he started. It was quite different from traveling over it on the back of his speedy pony. But it was something to be free, and free sooner than the robbers had any idea he would be.

"I may even be able to catch up to them, and trace which way they go," Jack thought.

He walked on for nearly an hour, when he heard the trot of a number of
Horses some distance ahead of him. Jack halted and listened intently.

"I wonder if those are the hold-up men coming back, to make sure I'm still tied up, or if it's my friends?" thought Jack. "I can't afford to take a chance. I'll hide in the bushes until I see who they are."

He knew every inch