“I say, Clan3,” said he, “you and Pink are not in this.”
“If not, why not?” demanded Ballard. “This party isn’t so blamed exclusive that Red and I can’t go along, is it?”
“You’ve nicked it, old man. The orders are for two, and no more.”
“Who sent the orders?”
“Give it up. They come through Dolliver.”
“Oh, Dolliver! Think it has anything to do with the robbery?”
“I hope not,” said Frank. “My biggest wish just now is that it has something to do with Lenning.”
“Don’t you know that, Chip?” queried5 Clancy.
“I don’t know a thing about why we’re going out there. It’s a hurry-up call, and no more than two are to come.”
“Then that settles it,” said Ballard. “Two are to go, and you’ve chosen Blunt. Take your ride, Chip, but if you don’t get back in a reasonable time, Red and I will get a couple of horses and follow you.”
“No,” Frank answered hastily, “don’t do that. I wasn’t to tell anybody but the chap who came with me where we were going. You fellows just stay here, keep mum, and
271
wait till we get back—if it isn’t until next week. Understand?”
“That’s a big order, Chip,” said Clancy, “but I guess we can fill it.”
“We’re going to Dolliver’s now,” Frank went on. “I haven’t a notion where we’ll go from Dolliver’s, or what we’re to do. So long, fellows!”
Rather gloomily Clancy and Ballard bade Chip and Barzy good-by, and wished them luck. The uncertainty6 in which Clancy and Ballard were left was not at all soothing7 to their nerves.
Blunt proceeded silently with Merriwell to the corral. It was not until they were mounted, and galloping8 stirrup to stirrup toward the Ophir Mine on their way to Dolliver’s that Blunt allowed himself to talk.
“It was Dolliver that got you on the wire, Chip?”
“Yes,” Frank nodded.
“What sort of a powwow did he give you?”
“I told Clan and Pink practically all of it, Barzy. Dolliver said that some one was just at his ranch and wanted him to telephone to me. It was noon, and this person who wanted the message sent told Dolliver he thought I could be caught at the Ophir House without any trouble; but, if I wasn’t there, then Dolliver was to try and get you.”
“Dolliver didn’t say who the fellow was that wanted one or t’other of us?”
“I asked him that, but he wouldn’t answer. He said I was to come to his place as quick as I could, was to bring just one person with me, and wasn’t to tell anybody but my companion about the message nor where I was going.”
“Suffering cats!” Blunt exclaimed. “This has got me worked up a-plenty, Chip. It’s a whale of a mystery, eh?”
272
“That’s what it is.”
By then, the boys were galloping past the mine, and the roar of the stamp mill was loud in their ears. Their course carried them on beyond the mine, and, as they got farther and farther away from it, the song of the stamps died by degrees into silence.
Dolliver’s ranch was fifteen miles from Ophir. Frank and his chums knew the place well, for they had made free use of Dolliver’s telephone, several weeks before, when the Ophir football squad9 was in camp at Tinaja Wells, in Mohave Cañon.
Dolliver’s home was entirely10 surrounded by a wild, unsettled country. Close to the pioneer’s adobe11, the bridle12 path through the cañon began its course, separating from the road that was used by wagons14 freighting for the Fiddleback outfit15.
“You don’t think this can be any sort of trap, do you, pard?” asked Blunt suddenly, while they were pounding along.
“Trap?” Frank laughed. “What sort of a trap, Barzy?”
“Give it up. If somebody wanted to get us into trouble, I reckon this would be a good way to do it.”
“I don’t know of anybody who’d want to get us into trouble. Anyhow, Dolliver wouldn’t. He’s a pretty good sort of a chap, that Dolliver.”
“You can bet your spurs on that!” declared the cowboy heartily16. “I’ve known Dolliver ever since I was knee-high, and he’s sure the clear quill17. You’re positive it was Dolliver talking at t’other end, of the line?”
“When you’ve heard Dolliver’s voice once,” said Frank, “you couldn’t mistake it for anybody else’s. Sure it was Dolliver talking.”
273
“The whole thing is so blamed queer that it sort of set me to wondering.”
“We’re winding18 up our stay in Arizona with a lot of blue fire and tremelo trimmings,” went on Frank. “If it’s going to do anybody any good, though, I don’t see how I can have any kick coming.”
“You’d like a heap to see Lenning and the colonel on good terms before you leave, wouldn’t you?”
“Nothing would suit me better, Barzy.”
“What luck did you have with the colonel at the golf grounds?”
“None at all. He’s bitter against Lenning.”
“Reckon I told you we’d have our trouble for our pains if we tried to put in a good word for Lenning, didn’t I? Hawtrey is a crabbed19 old proposition, and when he fastens himself to an idea you can’t pry20 him loose with a crowbar. It may be a fool idea, too, but that don’t count.”
“He said he’d like to oblige me by being friends with Lenning, but that I was asking him to break through a principle—which was something he wouldn’t do for anybody.”
“The colonel doesn’t take any stock in Lenning’s trying to act square with everybody. He’d rather watch a game of baseball than eat, but he’d never let himself get carried away to the extent that he’d overlook a grouch21 or forget an injury. He’s a pretty fine old fellow, too, if you come at him on the right side.”
Talking occasionally, but more often pounding along the trail in silence, the boys at last came to Dolliver’s lonely little cabin. They had hardly drawn22 rein23 before the rancher stepped through his front door.
“Put up yore critters, boys,” said he, “an’ then come
274
into the house. It won’t take me long to tell ye what I left out in palavering over the phone.”
With that, Dolliver stepped back through his front door.
“Pretty short about it,” remarked Frank.
“He’s worked up about something,” said Blunt. “He hasn’t any time for the extra frills when he’s bothered like that.”
They rode around the cabin to the corral, stripped the riding gear from their horses, and turned the animals into the small inclosure. A moment later, they were inside the house, occupying a couple of chairs and facing the rancher.
Dolliver had his pipe going, and his eyes were glittering strangely.
“Reckon ye’re some s’prised to be brought out here like this, eh?” he asked.
“Well, a little,” Frank acknowledged.
“Why’d ye come on such scant25 information?”
“Mainly because you gave us the information, Dolliver.”
“That’s you!” said Dolliver, with something like a cackle in his hairy throat. “Merriwell, ye’re plumb26 queer. I figgered that out some weeks back, when ye was up to Tinaja Wells, in camp. When a feller does ye dirt, ye don’t allers hide out in the bresh with a gun and wait fer him to come trompin’ by. Not you! Ye lay fer him with the glad hand, if he’ll only give ye half a chance. Blunt knows that,” he added significantly.
The red leaped into the cowboy’s face, and then slowly faded.
“I was a fool,” the cowboy grunted27. “Chip didn’t lay for me with the glad hand, either—not so you could notice. He licked me good and proper, right over there in Mohave Cañon. I needed the trimming.”
275
“Keno! And ye got what ye needed, Barzy. Ever since then ye’ve been purty sensible.” Again a smothered28 chuckle29 sounded in the rancher’s tanned throat. “Merriwell,” he continued, smoothing down the fire in his pipe with his thumb, “I hear ye’re purty soon to leave these parts, but I want to tell ye that ye’ve done a man’s work since ye’ve been in Ophir.”
“Don’t lay it on too thick, Dolliver,” Frank laughed. “I’ve made a few friends down this way, I guess, but they had as much to do with that as I had.”
“Mebbyso, mebbyso,” and the wave the rancher gave his hand signified that he had some opinions of his own on that matter. “But this palaver24 ain’t gittin’ us fur on the road ye’ve got ter travel.”
“Who asked you to send that message to us?” Frank asked.
“Ye ain’t goin’ to know it till ye find it out,” replied Dolliver. “I reckon that’s plain, ain’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose so; but when are we to find it out?”
“Purty quick. I opine ye know Mohave Cañon about as well as the next one, eh? Anyways, it’s plain to you betwixt here and Tinaja Wells?”
“I’ve gone over it enough so I ought to know it.”
“Correct. Well, I’m powerful glad ye brought Barzy along. Ye’re the two fellers that chap asked for. ‘If ye can’t git Merriwell,’ says he, ‘git Blunt.’ Fust choice was you, an’ next was Barzy. Ye’re to leave yer ridin’ stock with me an’ travel up the cañon afoot. That’s all.”
“Where are we to go?” asked Frank, puzzled.
“Ye’re to keep goin’ till some un stops ye. I couldn’t tell ye a thing more if I was ter be hung fer it. Better be movin’, boys. I don’t know whether there’s any time ter waste or not, but I opine not.”
Without delaying further, Merry and Blunt left the
276
cabin, crossed the main wagon13 road, and struck into the bridle path that led through the cañon. So far from clearing the mystery, Dolliver had only deepened it by his few remarks.
“I’d like to know what we’re up against,” grumbled30 Blunt, as he and Merry trudged31 onward32 between the high, rugged33 walls of the defile34.
“I guess we’ll find out before we go very far,” Merriwell answered.
In this he was correct. They had hardly put more than a mile between them and Dolliver’s when a voice hailed them from behind a mass of bowlders at the foot of the clifflike wall on their left.
They halted, recognizing the voice that had called to them and yet wondering if their imagination was playing them a prank35. But they were not mistaken. A form appeared around the edge of the pile of bowlders—a form that they recognized at once.
“Lenning!” Merriwell exclaimed.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
bent
|
|
| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
ranch
|
|
| n.大牧场，大农场 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
clan
|
|
| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
trotting
|
|
| 小跑，急走( trot的现在分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
queried
|
|
| v.质疑，对…表示疑问( query的过去式和过去分词 )；询问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
uncertainty
|
|
| n.易变，靠不住，不确知，不确定的事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
soothing
|
|
| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
galloping
|
|
| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
squad
|
|
| n.班，小队，小团体；vt.把…编成班或小组 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
adobe
|
|
| n.泥砖，土坯，美国Adobe公司 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
bridle
|
|
| n.笼头，束缚；vt.抑制，约束；动怒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
wagon
|
|
| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
wagons
|
|
| n.四轮的运货马车( wagon的名词复数 )；铁路货车；小手推车 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
outfit
|
|
| n.（为特殊用途的）全套装备，全套服装 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
heartily
|
|
| adv.衷心地，诚恳地，十分，很 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
quill
|
|
| n.羽毛管；v.给（织物或衣服）作皱褶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
winding
|
|
| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
crabbed
|
|
| adj.脾气坏的；易怒的；（指字迹）难辨认的；（字迹等）难辨认的v.捕蟹( crab的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
pry
|
|
| vi.窥(刺)探，打听；vt.撬动(开，起) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
grouch
|
|
| n.牢骚，不满；v.抱怨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
drawn
|
|
| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
rein
|
|
| n.疆绳，统治，支配；vt.以僵绳控制，统治 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
palaver
|
|
| adj.壮丽堂皇的；n.废话，空话 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
scant
|
|
| adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
plumb
|
|
| adv.精确地，完全地；v.了解意义，测水深 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
grunted
|
|
| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
smothered
|
|
| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
chuckle
|
|
| vi.／n.轻声笑，咯咯笑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
grumbled
|
|
| 抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
trudged
|
|
| vt.& vi.跋涉，吃力地走（trudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
onward
|
|
| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
rugged
|
|
| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
defile
|
|
| v.弄污，弄脏；n.(山间)小道 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
prank
|
|
| n.开玩笑，恶作剧；v.装饰；打扮；炫耀自己 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |