Howard Roger Garis

“ Teddy declared. "I'd run and I'd help you run. But I don't guess anything'll bite me. Anyhow, Indians don't bite."
"How do you know?" asked Janet. "Some Indians are wild. I heard Uncle Frank say so, and wild things bite!"
"But not Indians," insisted Teddy. "A Indian's mouth, even if he is wild, is just like ours, and it isn't big enough to bite. You've got to have an awful big mouth to bite."
"Henry Watson bit you once, I heard mother say so," declared Janet, as she and her brother still stood by the rocks and listened again for the funny sound to come from the stones. ”

“ 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. ”

“ As the wild little horses trotted out through the gate, behind which Trouble stood, well out of danger, the cowboys rode after them, yelling and shouting and shooting their revolvers.
"What a lot of noise!" cried Janet, covering her ears with her hands as she got down off the fence.
"I like it!" laughed Teddy. "It's like a Wild West show!" ”

“ And now let me see you Curlytops—and Trouble, too—though his hair isn't frizzy like Ted's and Janet's—let me see you eat until you get as fat as a Ring Rosy yourselves. If you don't eat as much as you can of everything, Hop Sing will feel as though he was not a good cook. ”

“ A ghost, eh?" laughed Baldy. "Well, I've never been on a trail after one of them, but I've trailed Indians—and helped catch 'em, too."
"How do you do it?" asked Teddy eagerly.
"Well, you just keep on riding—following the trail you know—until you catch up to those you're after. Sometimes you can't see any marks on the ground and you have to guess at it."
"And do the Indians ride on ahead and try to get away?" asked Janet.
"Indeed they do. When they know we're after 'em they ride as fast as they can. That is, if they've done wrong, like taking horses or cattle that aren't theirs. ”

“ At the foot of the hill Teddy stopped the goat and Janet, taking Trouble with her, got out and walked back to the house.
"What's the matter now?" asked Mrs. Martin from the porch where she had come out to get a little fresh air.
"Ted's playing Wild West in the goat-wagon," explained Janet.
"Oh, Ted! Don't be so rough!" begged his mother of her little son, who drove up just then.
"Oh, I'm only playing Indians and stage coach," he said. "You've got to go fast when the Indians are after you!" and away he rode.
"He's awful mean!" declared Janet. ”

“ I'm glad I came."
"So'm I. Oh, look at the lots of ponies!" she cried, as she and Ted turned a corner of one of the ranch buildings and came in sight of a new corral. In it were a number of little horses, some of which hung their heads over the fence and watched the Curlytops approaching.
"I'd like to ride one," sighed Teddy wistfully.
"Oh, you mustn't!" cried Jan. "Uncle Frank wouldn't like it, nor mother or father, either. You have to ask first."
"Oh, I don't mean ride now," said Ted. "Anyhow, I haven't got a saddle."
"Can't you ride without a saddle?" asked Janet. ”

“ When the Curlytops drew closer to the ranch they could see that one of the buildings was a house, almost like their own in the East, only not so tall. It was all one story, as were the other buildings, some of which were stables for the horses and some sleeping places, or "bunk houses," for the cowboys, while from one building, as they approached closer, there came the good smell of something cooking.
"That's the cook's place," said Uncle Frank, pointing with his whip. "All the cowboys love him, even if he is a Chinaman." ”

“ Janet looked at the cave. She remembered that she had seen some quite small ponies, not only on Ring Rosy Ranch but elsewhere. The cave would be large enough for one of them.
"I'm going in," said Teddy, as he stood at the mouth of the hole among the piled-up rocks.
"He might kick you," warned Janet.
"If he's sick enough to groan that way he can't kick very hard," replied Teddy. "Anyhow, I'll keep out of the way of his feet. That's all you've got to do, Uncle Frank says, when you go around a strange horse. When he gets to know you he won't kick." ”

“ If you Curlytops can, I'll give you each another pony."
"I'd like Clipclap best though," announced Teddy.
"What could we do with two?" asked Janet.
"Oh, every cowboy or cowgirl, for that matter, has more than one horse when he can," said Jim Mason. "Then if one gets lame he has another to ride. But don't you Curlytops go off by yourselves looking for those bad Indians!" he warned them.
"We won't," promised Teddy. "Well only go with you or Uncle Frank."
"We don't find them," said the ranch owner. "I guess the Indians sold the horses and cattle and then they hid themselves. ”

“ Up and down the street in front of their home the Martin children drove their pet goat.
"Whee, this is fun!" cried Ted, as he made Nicknack run downhill with the wagon.
"Oh, Teddy Martin, don't go so fast!" begged Janet.
"I like to go fast!" answered her brother. "I'm going to play Wild West. This is the stage coach and pretty soon the Indians will shoot at us!"
"Teddy Martin! if you're going to do that I'm not going to play!" stormed Janet. "You'll make Trouble fall out and get hurt. Come on, Trouble! Let us get out!" she cried. Nicknack was going quite fast down the hill. ”

“ One of the cowboys told me his pony did that once when he didn't know where to get a drink himself."
"I wish Star Face could find water," went on Janet. "I'd drink some of it, too."
"So would I—if it was clean," said Teddy.
Wearily the two Curlytops slipped from their saddles. The ponies seemed glad of this, and at once began to eat the grass that grew all about. Teddy and Janet looked at them awhile. It was not so dark but what they could see things close to them, and the stars were twinkling brightly overhead.
"They don't seem very thirsty," said Janet. ”

“ I guess you might have called him a wild Indian once," her uncle admitted. "He's pretty old and I shouldn't wonder but what he had been on the warpath against the white settlers."
"Oh!" exclaimed Janet. "Maybe he'll get wild again!"
"Oh, no he won't!" laughed Uncle Frank. "He's only too glad now to live on the reservation and sell the baskets the squaws make. The Indian men don't like to work."
Running Horse, which was the queer name the Indian had chosen for himself, or which had been given him, walked along, wrapped in his blanket, though the day was a warm one. ”

“ A little later the Curlytops and Baby William were laughing and shouting in the barn, rolling down and tumbling over one another, but not getting hurt, for the hay was too soft.
Pretty soon the dinner horn blew and, with good appetites from their morning's fun, the children hurried in to get something to eat.
"This is a good dinner!" announced Teddy as he passed his plate a second time.
"Yes," agreed Mother Martin. "I hope your father and the cowboys have as good."
"Oh, they'll have plenty—never fear!" laughed Uncle Frank's wife. "They never go hungry when they're on the trail." ”

“ As the train sped along the Curlytops could look through the windows off across the fields and woods through which they passed.
"Isn't it just wonderful," said Mother Martin, "to think of sitting down to a nice meal which is being cooked for us while the train goes so fast? Imagine, children, how, years ago, the cowboys and hunters had to [50] go on horses all the distance out West, and carry their food on their pony's back or in a wagon called a prairie schooner. How much easier and quicker and more comfortable it is to travel this way."
"I'd like to ride on a pony," said Teddy. ”

“ 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?" ”

“ It takes a doctor who knows about them to give them the right kind of medicine."
"I thought all medicine was alike," said Teddy. "What our doctor gives us is always bitter."
"Well, all medicine isn't bitter," laughed Doctor Bond, "though some very good kinds are. However, I wouldn't know whether to give this Clipclap pony bitter or sweet medicine."
"Maybe you could ask one of the cowboys," said Janet. "I heard Mr. Mason—Jim, Uncle Frank calls him—telling how he cured a sick horse once."
"Oh, yes, your uncle's foreman, Jim Mason, knows a lot about horses," said Doctor Bond. ”

“ Work on a ranch is hard enough without little boys letting the horses run wild after they have once been caught."
"Oh, well, no great harm was done," said Uncle Frank with a good-natured laugh, "though it did make us ride pretty hard for a while. Come on, Trouble, I'll take you ponyback!"
This was what Trouble liked, and he soon dried his tears and sat on the saddle in front of Uncle Frank as happy as could be. Janet and Ted got out their ponies, and rode with Uncle Frank and Trouble around the outside of the corral, looking at the little horses inside the fence. ”

“ For a while they could see many marks in the soft ground—the marks of horses' feet, some shod with iron shoes and others bare, for on the prairie grass there is not the same need of iron shoes on the hoofs of horses as in the city, with its hard, paved streets. Then the marks were not so plain; and pretty soon, about a mile from the spring amid the rocks where the ground was quite hard, Teddy and Janet could see no marks at all. ”

“ No!" he exclaimed, and he talked loudly, perhaps just so he would not be afraid. You know a boy always whistles very loudly at night when he is walking along a dark place alone. And if there are two boys they both whistle. What girls do when they walk through a dark place alone I do not know. Maybe they sing.
Anyhow Teddy talked very loud, and when Janet heard him say he was not afraid she felt better.
"But will we have to stay out here all night?" she asked.
"I guess so," Teddy answered. "But it'll be just like camping out. Daddy and Uncle Frank and the cowboys are going to stay out." ”

“ The children drew near enough to hear what the cowboy and the foreman were talking about.
"More horses gone!" exclaimed Jim Mason. "Well, we'll surely have to get after those Indians; that's all there is about it!"
"More horses stolen?" asked Daddy Martin, coming out just then.
"Yes," answered Jim Mason. "A lot of good ones. I guess more Indians must have run away from the reservation. We'll have to hunt them down!"
"Oh, I wish I could go!" sighed Teddy. "I'd like to be an Indian fighter."
"You'll have to grow a lot bigger," said his uncle, with a laugh. ”