im to get back in time to join one of the posses
in their hunt for the outlaws."

His jest did not win any smiles. The men grimly watched him saddle and
ride away. A quarter of an hour later they too were in the saddle.

CHAPTER IX

MURDER IN THE CHAPARRAL

To Jack Roberts, engaged at the Delmonico restaurant in the serious
business of demolishing a steak smothered in onions, came Pedro Menendez
with a strange story of a man lying dead in the rim-rock, a bullet-hole
in the back of his head.

The Mexican _vaquero_ came to his news haltingly. He enveloped it in
mystery. There was a dead man lying at the foot of Battle Butte, out in
the rim-rock country, and there was this wound in the back of his head.
That was all. Pedro became vague at once as to detail. He took refuge in
shrugs and a poor memory when the Ranger pressed him in regard to the
source of his information.

Roberts knew the ways of the Mexicans. They would tell what they wanted
to tell and no more. He accepted the news given him and for the moment
did not push his questions home.

For twenty-four hours the Ranger had been in the saddle, and he was
expecting to turn in for a round-the-clock sleep. But Pedro's tale
changed his mind. Captain Ellison was at Austin, Lieutenant Hawley at
Tascosa. Regretfully Roberts gave up his overdue rest and ordered
another cup of strong coffee. Soon he was in the saddle again with a
fresh horse under him.

The Panhandle was at its best. Winter snows and spring rains had set it
blooming. The cacti were a glory of white, yellow, purple, pink, and
scarlet blossoms. The white, lilylike flowers of the Spanish bayonet
flaunted themselves everywhere. Meadowlarks chirruped gayly and
prairie-hens fluttered across the path in front of the rider.

Battle Butte had received its name from an old tradition of an Indian
fight. Here a party of braves had made a last stand against an
overwhelming force of an enemy tribe. It was a flat mesa rising sharply
as a sort of bastion from the rim-rock. The erosions of centuries had
given it an appearance very like a fort.

Jack skirted the base of the butte. At the edge of a clump of prickly
pear he found the evidence of grim tragedy which the circling buzzards
had already warned him to expect. He moved toward it very carefully, in
order not to obliterate any footprints. The body lay face down in a
huddled heap, one hand with outstretched finger reaching forth like a
sign-post. A bu