“Every last one of them.” She was once more holding the glasses to her eyes. “I might have known there wasn’t a chance in a million of any one finding a tumbleweed with a message in it. But I thought that, with men scouring the country all about, somebody surely would stumble onto one of them and be curious enough to find out what had been tied to a thing like that. There are two automobiles at the ranch. The sheriff’s, I suppose.”
“Don’t be discouraged yet,” he comforted her. “Maybe they’ve sent my letter to Los Angeles, and have not yet got a satisfactory answer. In which case they wouldn’t signal until to-morrow at noon—or next day, if the answer was still delayed. Perk up, dear! You had a great scheme—too great to fail.”
“There goes a lone rider toward Squawtooth—from the mountains, I guess. Looked like Ed Chazzy’s caballo. Yes, that’s the cream he rides. That’s Ed, too. I—oh, there! There! They’re signaling! Look!”
“You’re right. I can see a fleck of red against the cottonwood with my naked eye. You keep the glasses.”
She glued the binoculars to her eyes and watched.
“Sure enough! There’s a man up in the tree with a red blanket, or something. And—yes!—there’s another fellow standing at the foot. Everything’s all right. But say—I guess we’re not so notorious as we thought. Can you imagine all of the rest of them in there at dinner? Cool! Well, I guess we’ll have to really hold up the stage, or do something, to wake them up. I thought perhaps we were making a hit!”
“How about Mart?” he asked.
“Goodness! I’d almost forgotten him. Why, there’s no sign of him at all. Something is wrong, Tom. The kid would never, never fail us. If the signal were genuine, the instant it had been raised old Podhead would be on that bronc and riding him to a fare-you-well. It’s wrong—all wrong! A trick! I see it all now. Oh, I didn’t think such a thing of Pa Squawtooth! He’s refused to give Rattle-pod my half of the letter, and of course the kid has had no chance to read the milk message. Oh, Pa Squawtooth! I’ll never forgive you! And the coarseness of their work, Tom. Even though they’re trying to fake us, they ought to have sense enough to all stand out there and look on. They don’t know enough to try and make the proceeding appear natural. That alone might scare us off, even if we didn’t know the signal is a trap.”
“Not so fast,” said The Falcon. “It has just occurred to me that perhaps your father has offered a reward to the man who brings us in.”
“It would be just like him.”