A Vendetta of the Hills

Willis Emerson

Willis George Emerson

A Vendetta of the Hills

TO MY WIFE

BONNIE O’NEAL EMERSON

Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,

As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem’ries of the past.

Heaven’s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life

When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,

Has her “hubby” for her dearie,

And her “hubby” has a sweetheart for his wife.

    – The Author.

В В В В January 18, 1917.

CHAPTER I – Guadalupe

IT was a June morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over the rim of the horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing in golden sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It was a rural scene of magnificent grandeur – encircling mountains, rolling foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.

Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers – some sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the mountain streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they deemed it proper to begin the day with a morning libation.

To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi mountain range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in ruins, picturesque if no longer formidable – a romantic relic of old frontier fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls, sheltered under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.

Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation, swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the cattle, had felt the call for their “morning’s morning.”

A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of the near-by rugged canyons.

The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.

“Here’s Dick Willoughby,” someone announced.

The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.

Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young fellow who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an architect from New York City, but during the last five years had become an adopted son of the West – had made the sacrifice, or rather gone through the improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.

“Good morning, Ches, old boy,” he shouted to the lieutenant.

The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.

“The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,” he said. “Who is the fair senorita that keeps you away?”

“That’s all right,” replied Willoughby, smiling. “I will tell you later.” Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he eagerly exclaimed: “Boys, she is coming.”

“What! Guadalupe?” shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.

“Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail an hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the moving speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just beyond yon clump of trees and will be here shortly.”

“I am wonderin’ if she’s got her apron filled again with them there gold nuggets,” remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over his grey-bearded countenance. “That squaw is a regular free-gold placer proposition.”

“She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?” laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term of years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title had still clung to him.

“By gad!” exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young fellow in manner and appearance. “She’s not going to get back to her hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o’-the-wisp placer gold mine of hers unless