The Secret of Wildcat Swamp (7 page)

“I wish we could find out just what is behind all these goings-on,” Cap said. “It doesn't seem likely that a gang of ex-convicts would be worried about our finding a few fossils. What can be the real secret of Wildcat Swamp?”

“It must be pretty valuable for somebody to go to such great lengths to protect it!” Frank stated with a tight smile.

Slowly they walked back toward camp, winding the antenna wires on the spindle as they went along. Even though the balloon itself was useless now, the aerial could be salvaged.

They had almost reached the tent when they heard the sound of hoofbeats behind them, coming down the ravine. Tight-lipped, they waited for the horsemen to appear.

“Oh, it must be the Forest Rangers,” Joe announced, relaxing, as three green-uniformed riders appeared.

The one in the middle was short, wiry, and gruff-looking. To his left was a medium-sized man, and the third ranger, also short, had a peculiarly flat nose.

“Who are you birds?” asked the wiry leader.

“What are you doing in these parts?” the flat-nosed one spoke up.

Courteously, Cap introduced himself and the Hardys, explaining their business in the community.

The leader, who apparently was indifferent to the fit and condition of his uniform, nodded.

“Well, I have bad news for you. You're going to have to call it all off.”

“What do you mean?” Cap demanded.

“I mean that we're ordering you to pack up your stuff and clear out of this territory.”

“But we have permission from the owner!” Joe protested, stepping forward. “She knows all about this expedition!”

“I said you'll have to pack up and clear out,” the spokesman retorted in a rasping voice. “If you must know, this is an order from the government.”

“For us to get out?” Cap asked unbelievingly.

“Everyone around here has been ordered to move all belongings away,” the ranger continued. “It's going to become a government reserve.”

In dismay, Cap and the Hardy boys looked at one another. If the government had closed the territory, there was no alternative for them but to leave. Cap begged for an extension of time, but was turned down.

“Get on the trail,” the ranger ordered.

He and the other men followed the fossil hunters to their camp and stood by to see that they packed up. Discouraged, the three went through the process of folding the tent and dismantling all their permanent fixtures.

“Get a move on! We haven't got all day!” the leader of the rangers commanded, watching the proceedings with a grim smile.

“All right, but we have to pack some of this stuff carefully,” Frank answered as he began to stow away the radio equipment.

“Say, son, have you got a state license for that?” the officer asked. “If you haven't we'll just have to take it.”

Frank was astounded. “State license? I never heard of such a thing. I have my regular radio license.”

“That's not enough. You need a special one around here,” the spokesman announced. “Short wave, ain't it? Yep, that's the story. Pick it up, men,” he ordered the other rangers.

“But you can't do that!” Joe sputtered. “The radio belongs to us.”

“Sure, sure, and you can have it back,” the man replied, “by calling at our district office for it next month.”

Despite more protests, the rangers, fingering their holsters, coolly appropriated the set. Discouraged and quiet, the trio rode off toward Red Butte, with the three men in uniform following them to see that they left the area.

Cap was downhearted because he had come close to finishing his uncle's task. Although he had the two pieces of fossil carefully stowed aboard the pack mule, he was sure other parts of the ancient camel remained on the slope. What a thrill it would have been to find a whole skeleton!

“All right now, just keep going a good ten miles before you stop,” called the leader of the rangers. “And after this, do your fossil digging some place else besides Wildcat Swamp!”

There were no words spoken among the three as they jogged along. But as soon as they had put sufficient distance between themselves and the rangers, they halted and held a council of war. It was decided not to put more than a mile between their new camp and the swamp.

“I'm not going to leave here until this whole mystery is solved,” Frank said determinedly. “Government reserve or not, if Willie and Turk and Flint have anything to do with this place, I'm going to find out about it.”

“Me, too,” Joe added. “I never thought of it, but we probably should have told the rangers our suspicions.”

“After we compare the fingerprints from the pistol with those your father's sending,” Cap spoke up, “we'll have more to go on.”

They dropped off the trail and dismounted near a small brook. Doggedly they went about the business of establishing their new base in a well-concealed spot.

“Dad said he'd send the prints by air mail,” Frank commented. “They'll probably be in Red Butte before we can get there ourselves.”

Cap looked at the Hardys more spiritedly than any time since they had been ordered away from the region of the swamp.

“Say, it might be a good idea if I started tonight for Red Butte,” he said. “Then I'd get there just in time to pick up the letter, and could head back here as soon as I had it. Traveling by moonlight ought to be safer than in broad daylight, the way things are going.”

Much as they disliked seeing Cap go off alone, the boys had to agree that his idea made sense.

“In the meantime, we can guard the gear and keep our eyes open for those jailbirds,” Frank said.

After a quick supper they helped Cap saddle up, and made sure he had enough provisions to last the trip. After he had ridden off, the boys, deciding against a campfire, crawled into their sleeping bags and lay down.

“I certainly didn't think much of those rangers,” Joe remarked with a yawn. “I always thought that rangers were well-uniformed, neat, and trim. That little mangy guy in the middle was the sloppiest-looking ranger I ever saw.”

“Say, I've been thinking about that very thing,” Frank retorted. “A lot of things those rangers said just didn't ring true—like that license business about the radio.”

“They sure were nasty and I've always heard that rangers are polite,” Joe said, recalling particularly their leader's parting shot. “ ‘Do your fossil digging some place else besides Wildcat Swamp,' ” the boy repeated in a voice imitating that of the ranger.

Frank suddenly sat up. “Joe! Do you realize what that ranger said?
Wildcat Swamp!”

“Sure. What about it?”

“Don't you remember Harry Sanderson telling us it's called Devil's Swamp?”

Joe's eyes grew round as he realized the implication. “Local rangers would probably have called it that, too.”

“Exactly. Those men might be phonies. Let's get back to the slope and see what's going on!”

Quietly they rode through the brush, keeping off the trail as much as possible, until they were less than half a mile from the upper mouth of the defile. There they tied their horses, and went on afoot.

Down the defile they crept, listening for alien sounds. In a short time they were standing on the rock ledge above the slope. The moon had been blotted out by a cloud a moment before, so now there was blackness all around them.

Joe grabbed Frank's arm. “Look down there!”

Shining from the entrance to the cave was a bright light!

“LET'S crawl down and look in the cave!” Joe whispered.

“Okay. But take it easy. There may be a guard, and when that cloud passes over, we'll be good targets for him.”

Stealthily the Hardys crept down the incline. It was treacherous going in the darkness, without the rope, and complete quiet was absolutely necessary .

“Can you see anything?” Joe whispered as they finally reached the lip of the opening and Frank peered cautiously over it.

The answer was a tightening of Frank's grip on his arm. Wriggling closer, Joe's eyes searched downward into the cavern, and he nearly cried out.

The boys could hear the murmur of their voices but could not make out their muffled conversation.

Unable to determine exactly what the men were doing, Joe tried to squirm around for a better view.

On the very edge of the opening, his elbow slipped. Before he could prevent it, a stream of pebbles and stones cascaded down into the cave!

“What's that?” grunted one of the men.

The boys heard startled exclamations as the rangers in the cave jumped to their feet.

“Someone's up therel Get'em!”

Furious that they had been discovered, the Hardys scrambled up the slope. There was no use trying to be quiet now, and they slipped and stumbled as they made their way toward the ledge.

Behind them, there was an uproar as the rangers gave chase. Just then the moon came out from behind a dark cloud and the ledge was bathed in moonlight.

“Run faster!” urged Frank as they headed for the shadows of the defile.

There was hardly need for Frank's advice. Joe already was tearing along at top speed. Just as they reached the entrance of the rocky passageway, there was a loud report behind them.
Pt-s-s-s.
ee-ee!

A bullet whistled overhead, then another, and another. The sound of flying lead lent wings to the feet of the Hardy boys.

“Stay off the trail! Cut across the other way!” Frank hissed.

Joe let his brother pass him. Frank dashed through a tangle of underbrush, up the steep slope of the defile, and into the woods. They struggled over rough ground, running into low-hanging branches, tripping over roots, falling to hands and knees innumerable times.

A wild search was made with flashlights by the rangers behind them. Again and again the boys dodged the beams. Finally they were able to throw off their pursuers, and they breathed a sigh of relief when all sounds of the chase ceased.

Frank and Joe stopped to rest. After a breathless moment, Joe found his voice to express new concern.

“What if they find our horses!”

“Just hope that they don't. Anyway, we're safe! I wonder where we are. I've lost my bearings completely.”

For some time they searched in vain in the darkness for a familiar landmark, but in the shadowy woods there was little they could see. Joe was about to suggest that they give up looking for camp until morning, when Frank whispered:

“SSS-s-st! A light!”

Up ahead, they could see a dim light bobbing in midair, as if it were suspended from nothing.

A few seconds later there came the soft clopclop of a horse's hoofs slowly picking a path among the trees.

“Maybe the rider's meeting someone here,” Joe said.

Quickly the Hardys found cover, and waited. Within minutes the rider came abreast of their hiding place. The soft glow of the lantern he held lit up his youthful features.

Harry Sanderson !

“Golly, are we glad to see you!” Joe greeted him. “We're lost.”

“I'm just as glad to see you!” the boys replied. “I was on my way to find you.”

Frank explained what had happened, from the time they had been ordered out of the fossil area to the present moment. When he heard their description of the rangers, Harry said he did not know the men. And oddly enough, he had never seen the cave.

“You didn't tell us Wildcat Swamp was to become a government reserve,” Joe chided him.

Harry's eyes flicked wide open in amazement. “It's not true. I mean, my mother and I haven't heard anything about it. Something mighty funny's going on. A man came to our ranch this evening to buy the swamp.”

Harry went on to say that a stranger had dropped in with papers to show his mother that Devil's Swamp and a lot of the ranch belonged to someone else, and the man was going to buy it from the real owner.

Frank and Joe were baffled by Harry's revelations. They began to realize that a great deal was happening in the Wildcat Swamp area that was mysterious and which their father would want them to investigate.

“All my mother really owns,” Harry went on, “is the house and a few acres around it—at least that's what the man said.”

“Who was this man?” Frank asked, his eyes flashing with indignation,

“His name is George Moffet. I never saw him before. Guess he doesn't live around here. He was a little guy, pale and beady-eyed.”