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The imitation stampede seemed to be a great success, and no one, not in the secret, could have told that it was not a real one. "Over this way, Paul!" cried Baldy, who was taking part with the young actor. "I'm supposed to rescue you, and I can't do it if you keep so far away."
There, crossing the stream higher up, and seemingly at a place which the fire had only narrowly missed, were several horsemen. Their steeds appeared exhausted, as though they had had a hard race to escape. "What outfit is that, fellows?" asked Baldy Johnson. "I don't know of any punchers attached to a ranch that's within this here fire range." "There isn't any," declared Necktie Harry.
"That globe-ship was never built on this world. Use your head, Murdock. Think about your furry-faced friend and the baldy with him. Did either look like normal Terrans to you?" "But a spaceship!" It was something that had so long been laughed to scorn. When men had failed to break into space after the initial excitement of the satellite launchings, space flight had become a matter for jeers.
You take one of these here 'canucks' and he's blamed near as good if not a better placer miner than a Chink; more ingenious and just as savin'. Say, Baldy, will you keep off my heels? If I have to tell you again about walkin' up my pant leg I aim to break your head in.
"It's always getting snarled and the comb gets stuck in it." "And it does in mine, too," added Janet. "And mother pulls when she tries to untangle it. Mine's longer than Ted's." "Yes, and nicer, for that reason," went on Baldy. "Though I'd be glad if I had even half of yours, Teddy. But never mind about that. I won't take your hair, though I'd like to know what makes you both so gloomy-like.
There Baldy, swinging his lantern to and fro, said he thought he could see the marks of the feet of Star Face and Clipclap among those of other ponies, but he was not sure. "We'll have to come back here and start out early in the morning when we can see better," he said. "And what are we going to do all night?" asked another cowboy. "Well, we'll keep on hunting, of course.
For Baldy had but one criterion; that of efficiency as the result of honest endeavor. And it was indeed a trial for a conscientious plodder to see the ease with which idle canines possessed themselves of the comforts and privileges that by right belong alone to those whose industry has earned them.
An old gunner's mate of the mess Priming, the man with the hare-lip, who, true to his tribe, was charged to the muzzle with bile, and, moreover, rammed home on top of it a wad of sailor superstition this gunner's mate indulged in some gloomy and savage remarks strangely tinged with genuine feeling and grief at the announcement of the sick-ness of Shenly, coming as it did not long after the almost fatal accident befalling poor Baldy, captain of the mizzen-top, another mess-mate of ours, and the dreadful fate of the amputated fore-top-man whom we buried in Rio, also our mess-mate.
Baldy tried again to argue with Jumping Horse and some of the others, but it was useless. To all the cowboy's arguments, and even threats, the reply was that if the prisoners left before the ceremonies were over all the medicine and magic would be spoiled. "We'll have to stay, then," sighed Mr. DeVere. "But it will be out of the question to remain a week and you say that it will take that long?"
Teddy and Janet were very glad to hear these stories, but listening to them made Ted, at least, wish all the more that he could have gone with his father and his Uncle Frank on the trail after the Indians. Then Baldy was called away by another cowboy, who wanted to ask him something about a sick horse, and Teddy and Janet were called by their mother to take care of Trouble for a while.
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