Janet and Teddy sat beside the gopher hole, while their ponies, not far from them, ate the sweet grass of the prairie. Clipclap and Star Face did not wander away, even if they were not tied to a hitching post. For Western horses and cow ponies are trained to stand where their master leaves them, if he will but toss the reins over their heads and let them rest on the ground.
When a pony sees that this has been done he will never run away, unless perhaps something frightens him very much. It may be that he thinks, when the reins are over his head and down on the ground, they are tied to something, so he could not run away if he wanted to.
At any rate, Clipclap and Star Face stayed where Ted and Janet left them, and the little Curlytops watched the gopher hole.
"I wonder when he'll come out," said Janet after a bit.
"Shs-s-s-s!" whispered Teddy. "Don't talk!"
"Why not?" asked his sister.
"'Cause you might scare him. You mustn't talk any more than if you were fishing."
"A gopher isn't a fish!"
"I know it," said Teddy. "But you've got to keep quiet."
So he and Janet remained very quiet, watching the hole. Suddenly Janet gave Teddy a slight tap with her hand. He had looked off to see if the ponies were all right.
"What's the matter?" asked Teddy.
"Hush!" whispered Janet. "There he is."
She pointed to the gopher's hole. Teddy saw a tiny black nose and a pair of sparkling eyes as a head was thrust a little way out of the burrow.
"I'll get him!" cried the little boy.
With outstretched hand he made a grab toward the hole. But his fingers only grasped a lot of dirt and stones. The gopher had dived down back into his hole as soon as he saw Teddy's first move.
"Oh, he got away!" said Janet sorrowfully.
"Ill get him next time," declared Teddy.
But he did not. Three or four times more the little animal put his small head and bright eyes out of the top of the hole, and each time Teddy made a grab for him; but the gopher was too quick. Finally Janet said:
"I guess we better go home, Teddy."
"Why?"
"Oh, it's getting late, and I'm getting hungry."
"So'm I. I'll wait until he comes up once more and then well go."
Once more the gopher peeped up, as if wondering why in the world those two strange children did not go away and let him alone. Ted made a grab for him, but missed and then the little boy said:
"Come on, Jan. Now we'll go home!"
"And we haven't any nice little gopher to take to Trouble," said Janet sadly.
"Oh, well, maybe it would bite him if we did catch one," reflected her brother. "I'll take him some of these pretty stones," and he picked up some from the ground. "He'll like to play with these."
Teddy whistled for his pony and Clipclap came slowly up to his little master. Janet held out a bunch of grass to Star Face and her pony, just as he had been taught, came up to her. Teddy helped his sister get up in the saddle. It was not hard for them, as the ponies were small, and Jim Mason had showed them how to put one foot in the stirrup, and then, with one hand on the saddle and the other grasping both the bridle and the pony's mane, give a jump that carried them up. But though Janet could mount her pony alone Teddy always helped her when he was with her by holding the stirrup.
"Let's have another race home," suggested Teddy, when they had started.
"No," answered his sister. "You might fall some more and get hurt. We'll ride slow."
So they did, though Teddy was anxious for a good, fast gallop.
"Well, did you have a nice time?" asked Mother Martin, as they came to the house after putting away their ponies.
"We had lots of fun," answered Janet "Teddy fell off his pony—"
"Fell off his pony!" cried her mother.
"He threw me!" explained Ted, and then he told what had happened.
"An' didn't you catch noffin for me?" asked Trouble, who heard his brother telling the story of his adventure.
"I brought you these nice stones," and Teddy took them out of his pocket. "You can play with them, Trouble."
Baby William laughed and sat down to play with the stones.
"Did the cowboys come back with the Indians?" asked Teddy of Aunt Millie when she was giving him and Janet some bread and jam to eat.
"No, not yet, Curlytop. I expect Uncle Frank and the boys will be gone all night."
"Will they have a house to sleep in?" asked Janet.
"No, unless they happen to be near one when it gets dark. But they took their blankets with them, and it's so warm that they'll just wrap up in them and sleep out on the prairie," said Aunt Millie.
"Won't they be hungry?" Teddy inquired, as he took a big bite of the bread and jam.
"Oh, no! Don't you remember I told you they always take something to eat with them when they go out this way? They are used to camping on the prairies, and they know how to make a fire, broil the bacon and make their coffee," answered Aunt Millie. "You need never worry about Uncle Frank and his cowboys. They'll be all right."
And so they were. It was not until the next afternoon that the party which had gone out to chase the Indians came back. They were tired, because they had ridden a good many miles, but they said they had slept well and had had enough to eat.
"Did you catch the Indians?" asked Teddy eagerly.
"No, Curlytop," answered Uncle Frank. "I'm sorry to say we did not. They got away from us."
"Did you see them?" asked Daddy Martin.
"Yes, but they were a long way off. Too far for us to get at them."
"And did they have your cattle with them?"
"Yes, they had a lot of my best animals. I guess they must be hiding away somewhere among the hills and mountains. We came pretty close to them at one time, and they suddenly disappeared. It seems as if they must have gone into a big hole or cave. We couldn't find them."
"Are you going to look any more?" Teddy questioned. "And if you do go, Uncle Frank, please can't I go too?"
"Well, most likely we will have another hunt for the Indians," answered the ranchman, "but I'm afraid we couldn't take you along, Curlytop."
"Why not, Uncle Frank?"
"Oh, you might get hurt."
"Well, can I see the Indians after you catch 'em?"
"Oh, yes, I guess I can promise you that," and Uncle Frank smiled at Daddy Martin.
"And can I ask them to make me a bow and arrows?" went on Teddy.
"Yes, you can ask them, but I don't believe they will," Uncle Frank replied. "These Indians aren't very nice. They're quite bad, in fact, and we all wish they'd stay where they belong and not come off their reservation and steal our cattle and horses."
"Well, I'm going to ask one to make me a bow and some arrows when you catch 'em," decided Teddy.
That afternoon Teddy saw his sister trying to do something with bits of string and sticks in a shady spot on the porch.
"What are you making, Jan," he asked. "A cat's cradle?"
"Pooh! you don't make a cat's cradle with sticks," said the little girl.
"Well, I thought maybe it was a new kind, or maybe a kitten's cradle," laughed Teddy.
"Nope; it isn't that either," went on Janet, as she kept on twisting the strings around the sticks.
"Well, what are you making?"
"A bow and arrow."
"Ho! Ho!" laughed Jan's brother "You can't make a bow and arrow that way. Anyhow you don't need a string for an arrow."
"I know that!" Jan said. "But I'm making the bow first, and then I'm going to make the arrow. The arrow part is what you shoot, isn't it, Ted?"
"Yes," he answered. "I'll help you, Jan. I didn't mean to laugh at you," he went on, for he saw that Janet was very much in earnest about what she was doing. "I know how to make a bow and arrows."
"Oh, please show me!" begged Janet. "I want to know how to shoot like the Indians."
Teddy, however, did not have much better luck making the bow than his sister had had. The trouble was that the sticks Janet had picked up were not the right kind. They would not bend, and to make a bow that shoots arrows a piece of wood that springs, or bends, is needed. For it is the springy action of the wood that shoots the arrow on its way.
After trying two or three times, each time finding something wrong, Teddy said:
"Oh, I don't guess I can make a bow, either. Let's play something else."
"What'll we play?" asked Janet.
Teddy thought for a few moments. Playing out at Uncle Frank's ranch was different from playing at home. In some ways it was not so easy, for at home if the Curly-tops could not think up any way to have fun by themselves, they could run down the street and find some other boys and girls. But here there were no streets, and no other boys or girls unless Teddy and Janet went a long way to look for them, and they could not do that.
"I know what we can do," said Teddy, after a while. "We can get some blankets and cookies and play cowboy."
"How can you play cowboy with cookies and blankets?"
"I'll show you," Teddy answered, as he went into the house to get the things he wanted. He soon came out with some old quilts and the cookies, which were in a paper bag.
"Now," went on Janet's brother, "We'll go off on the prairie and make believe it's night and we have to stay out like the cowboys when they went after Uncle Frank's horses."
"Oh, that'll be fun!" cried Janet, and then she and Ted rolled themselves up in the old quilts and pretended to go to sleep on the soft grass of the prairie, making believe it was night, though of course it was not, for the sun was shining. Then they ate the cookies, pretending they were bacon, sandwiches, cake and other things that cowboys like.
Two or three days later Uncle Frank and the cowboys went out again to look for the Indians, but they did not find them. From other ranches word came of cattle and horses that had been stolen; and more cowboys were hired to keep watch over the animals that had to be left out in the big fields to eat their fill of grass. No barn was large enough to hold them.
Meanwhile Teddy and Janet were learning how to ride better each day. They could go quite fast now, though they were not allowed to make their ponies gallop except on ground where Uncle Frank knew there were no holes in which the animals might stumble.
Sometimes Daddy and Mother Martin went to ride with the children, and then they had good times together, taking their lunch and staying all day out on the prairie or in a shady grove of trees.
One day Ted and Janet saw some cowboys driving a number of ponies to the corral near the ranch buildings. Some of the animals were quite wild and went racing about as though they would like to run far off and not come back.
But the cowboys knew how to take care of the ponies. They rode around them, keeping them together in a bunch, and if one started to get away the cowboys would fire their revolvers and yell, so the pony would become frightened and turn back.
"Did you take these ponies away from the Indians?" asked Teddy, as he saw the little animals turned into the corral and the gate shut on them.
"No, these are some that have been running wild in a field away over at the far end of my ranch," explained Uncle Frank. "I had them brought in, as I'm going to ship some away to be sold."
"Come on, we'll go and look at the ponies," called Ted to his sister. "Are they very wild?" he asked Jim Mason, who had helped the cowboys bring them to the ranch corral.
"Yes, some of 'em are pretty wild," was the answer. "We had hard work making them come along. They want to get loose and do as they please."
Ted and Janet climbed up on the corral fence to look at the ponies. A few were somewhat tame, and allowed the Curlytops to pat them. But others were very wild, and ran about as though looking for a place to jump the fence or get out through a hole. But the fence was good and strong. It was high and had no holes in it.
"Lots of ponies!" murmured Trouble, as he toddled after his brother and sister to the corral.
"Yes, lots of 'em," agreed Janet. "You'll soon be a big boy and you can have a pony to ride like brother and sister."
"Trouble want pony now!" he exclaimed.
"Oh, no, not now," Janet said as she helped him get up on the lowest board of the fence, part of which was wooden, so he could look in better.
"What they run around like that for?" asked Trouble, as he saw some of the ponies racing about the corral.
"They want to get out," Janet answered.
"Trouble go help," murmured the little fellow, but Janet either did not hear what he said or she paid no attention, for just then two of the ponies had a race together around the corral and she and Ted wanted to see which would win.
Trouble got down off the fence and went around to the gate. His brother and sister did not notice him until, all at once, Janet, missing her little brother, cried:
"Where's Trouble?"
"I don't know," Ted answered. "Maybe he—Oh, look, Janet!" he suddenly cried. "The corral gate is open and all the ponies are running out!"
"Oh, that's right! They are!" Janet then screamed. "But where is Trouble?"
"I don't know. I guess he—Oh, there he is!" and Teddy pointed to a spot near the gate.
There stood Trouble between the fence and the big gate which had swung back on its hinges.
"Oh, look at 'em run!" cried Janet.
"They're all running out!" added Teddy excitedly. "I wonder who let 'em loose."
"Maybe it was Trouble," suggested Janet. "Oh, it was!" she went on. "Trouble must have opened the gate and let the ponies loose!"
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