Bert Wilson in the Rockies

A shower of glass from the shattered windowpane fell over the floor and seats, and a bullet embedded itself in the woodwork of an upper berth. There was a shriek from the women passengers in the crowded Pullman, and the men looked at each other in consternation. From the platform came the sound of a scuffle, interspersed with oaths. Then, through the narrow corridor that bordered the smoking-room, hurried two men, pushing the terrified negro porter ahead of them. Each of the intruders wore a black cloth tied over the lower part of his face, and before the bewildered passengers knew what had happened they found themselves looking along the blue-black barrels of two ugly revolvers.

It was a startling break in an uneventful day. For several hours the Overland Limited had hummed along over the boundless prairies that stretched away on either side with scarcely a break to the horizon. They had time to make up, and on these open spaces the engineer had let it out to the limit. So swiftly and smoothly had it sped along that the "click, click" as it struck each separate rail had merged into one droning "song of the road."

There had been no rain for a week past, and the dust lay thick on the grass and cactus. The motion of the train drew it up in clouds that made it impossible to keep the windows raised, and the sun, beating down pitilessly from a brazen sky, added to the general discomfort. Cooling drinks were at a premium, and the porters were kept busy making trips to the buffet car, from which they returned with tinkling glasses and cooling ices. Collars wilted and conversation languished. Women glanced listlessly over the pages of the magazines. Men drew their traveling caps over their eyes and settled down for a doze. Here and there a commercial traveler jotted down some item or wondered how far he dared to "pad" his expense account so that it would "get by" the lynx-eyed head of the firm. In the smoking-room a languid game of cards was being played, in an effort to beguile the tedious monotony of the trip. Over all there brooded a spirit of somnolence and relaxation.

If there was life to be discerned anywhere, it was in a group of three young fellows seated near the middle of the car. They would have drawn more than a passing glance wherever seen. Tall, well set up, muscular, they served as splendid types of young American manhood. None of them were over twenty, and their lean, bronzed faces, as well as the lithe alertness of their movements, spoke of a life spent largely in the open. They were brimming with life and high spirits. Exuberant vitality shone through their eyes and betrayed itself in every gesture. That they were friends of long standing was evident from the utter absence of ceremony and the free and easy comradeship with which they chaffed each other.

From the beginning of the trip they had been full of fun and merriment. Their college year had just closed, and they were like frolicsome colts turned out to pasture. There was hardly an incident of the journey that did not furnish to their keen, unjaded senses something of interest and amusement. Their cup of life was full and they drained it in great draughts.

But just now even their effervescence was calmed somewhat by the heat and spirit of drowsiness that hovered over the car.

"Gee," yawned the youngest of the three, stretching out lazily. "Isn't it nearly twelve o'clock? I wonder when that dusky gentleman will come along with the call to dinner."

"Always hungry," laughed one of the others. "The rest of us eat to live, but Tom lives to eat."

"You've struck it there, Dick," assented the third. "You know they say that no one has ever been able to eat a quail a day for thirty days hand running, but I'd be willing to back Tom to do it."

"Well, I wouldn't quail at the prospect," began Tom complacently, and then ducked as Dick made a pass at him.

"Even at that, I haven't got anything on you fellows," he went on, in an aggrieved tone. "When you disciples of 'plain living and high thinking' get at the dinner table, I notice that it soon becomes a case of high living and plain thinking."

"Such low-brow insinuations deserve no answer," said Dick severely. "Anyway," consulting his watch, "it's only half-past eleven, so you'll have to curb the promptings of your grosser nature."

"No later than that?" groaned Tom. "I don't know when a morning has seemed so long in passing."

"It is a little slow. I suppose it's this blistering heat and the long distance between stations. It's about time something happened to break the monotony."

"Don't raise false hopes, Bert," said Tom, cynically. "Nothing ever happens nowadays."

"Oh, I don't know," laughed Bert. "How about the Mexican bandits and the Chinese pirates? Something certainly happened when we ran up against those rascals."

"They were lively scraps, all right," admitted Tom, "but we had to go out of the country to get them. In the little old United States, we've got too much civilization. Everything is cut and dried and pared and polished, until there are no rough edges left. Think of the fellows that made this trip across the continent sixty years ago in their prairie schooners, getting cross-eyed from looking for buffalo with one eye and Indians with the other, feeling their scalp every five minutes to make sure they still had it. That was life."

"Or death," put in Dick skeptically.

"Then look at us," went on Tom, not deigning to notice the interruption, "rolling along smoothly at fifty miles an hour in a car that's like a palace, with its cushioned seats and electric lights and library and bath and soft beds and rich food and servants to wait upon us. We're pampered children of luxury, all right, but I'm willing to bet that those 'horny-handed sons of toil' had it on us when it came to the real joy of living."

"Tom was born too late?" chaffed Bert. "He doesn't really belong in the twentieth century. He ought to have lived in the time of Ivanhoe, or Young Lochinvar, or the Three Musketeers, or Robin Hood. I can see him bending a bow in Nottingham Forest or breaking a lance in a tournament or storming a fortress by day, and at night twanging a guitar beneath a castle window or writing a sonnet to his lady's eyebrow."

"Well, anyhow," defended Tom, "those fellows of the olden time had good red blood in their veins."

"Yes," assented Dick drily, "but it didn't stay there long. There were too many sword points ready to let it out."

And yet, despite their good-natured "joshing" of Tom, they, quite as much as he, were eager for excitement and adventure. In the fullest sense they were "birds of a feather." In earlier and ruder days they would have been soldiers of fortune, cutting their ways through unknown forests, facing without flinching savage beasts and equally savage men, looking ever for new worlds to conquer. Even in these "piping days of peace" that they so much deplored, they had shown an almost uncanny ability to get into scrapes of various kinds, from which sometimes they had narrowly escaped with a whole skin. Again and again their courage had been severely tried, and had stood the test. At home and abroad, on land and sea, they had come face to face with danger and death. But the fortune that "favors the brave" had not deserted them, even in moments of deadliest peril. They were accustomed to refer to themselves laughingly as "lucky," but those who knew them best preferred to call them plucky. A stout heart and a quick wit had "many a time and oft" extricated them from positions where luck alone would have failed them.

And most of their adventures had been shared in company. The tie of friendship that bound them together as closely as brothers was of long standing. Beginning at a summer camp, five years earlier, where chance had thrown them together, it had grown increasingly stronger with every year that passed. A subtle free masonry had from the start made each recognize the others as kindred spirits. Since this first meeting their paths had seldom diverged. Together they had gone to college, where their athletic prowess had put them in the first rank in sports and made them popular among their comrades. On the baseball diamond they had played their positions in brilliant fashion, and on the football gridiron they had added to their laurels. When Bert had been chosen to go to the Olympic games abroad, his "pals" had gone with him and exulted in his glorious victory, when, in the Marathon race, he had beaten the crack runners of the world. Nor were they to be denied, when his duty as wireless operator had carried him over the Pacific to meet with thrilling experiences among the yellow men of Asia. In every time of storm and stress they had stood with him shoulder to shoulder, and faced life and death with eyes wide open and unafraid. They were worthy lieutenants of a brave and intrepid leader.

For, that he was their leader, they themselves would have been the first to admit, although he would have modestly disclaimed it. He never asserted leadership, but it sought him out of its own accord. He had the instinct, the initiative, the quick decision, the magnetic personality that marks the born captain. It was not merely that he was endowed with strength of muscle and fleetness of foot and power of endurance that placed him in a class by himself. He might have had all these, and still been only a superb specimen of the "human animal." But, above and controlling these qualities, was the indomitable will, the unflinching courage, the gallant audacity that made him the idol of his comrades.

The college year just ended had been a notable one, marked by victories on track and field. Together with the high rank he had reached and held in his studies, with which, unlike many athletes, he never allowed sport to interfere, it had taxed him heavily in mind and body. And it was with unfeigned delight that he now looked forward to a long season of recreation and adventure on the ranch in Montana, toward which he and his friends were speeding.

Mr. Melton, the owner of the ranch, was a Western cattleman of the old type, now rapidly disappearing. Bluff, rough and ready, generous and courageous, his sterling qualities had won the admiration and affection of the boys from the date of their first meeting the year before.

That meeting had taken place under extraordinary circumstances. The "Three Guardsmen"--so called in joke, because they were always together--journeying to the opening of the Panama Canal had found themselves on the same train with Melton, as it wound its way through Central Mexico. A broken trestle had made it necessary for the train to halt for an hour or two, and during this enforced stop Dick had carelessly wandered away on a stroll through the woods, tempted by the beauty of the day and the novelty of his surroundings. At a turn in the road he had suddenly found himself in the presence of twenty or more guerillas, headed by the notorious El Tigre, whose name was spoken with a shudder throughout Mexico. They had bound him and carried him off to their mountain retreat. Bert and Tom, an hour later, discovered the cause of his absence and immediately started in pursuit, determined to save their comrade or die with him. But first they had disclosed the situation to Melton, who had sworn in his rage to follow after them and aid them in the rescue. How faithfully he had kept his word, how skillfully and daringly he had led them on and rushed the camp just as Dick was steeling himself to undergo the rattlesnake torture that the bandit chief had planned for him, was engraven indelibly on the memories of the boys. Until the day of their death they could never forget how the old war horse, with everything to lose and nothing to gain, had come to their assistance simply because they were Americans and in dire need of help.