The Curlytops at Uncle Frank's Ranch Part 15

They spent the morning playing about the ranch near the house. They made a sea-saw from a board and a barrel, and played some of the games they had learned on Cherry Farm or while camping with Grandpa Martin. Then dinner time came, but Uncle Frank and the cowboys did not come back to it.

"Won't they be hungry?" asked Teddy.

"Oh, they took some bacon, coffee and other things with them," said Aunt Millie. "They often have to camp out for days at a time."

"Say, I wish I could do that!" cried Teddy.

"Wait until you get to be a cowboy," advised his father.

That afternoon Trouble went to lie down with his mother to have a nap, and Teddy and Janet wandered off by themselves, promising not to go too far away from the house.

But the day was so pleasant, and it was so nice to walk over the soft gra.s.s that, before they knew it, Teddy and Janet had wandered farther than they meant to. As the land was rolling--here hills and there hollows--they were soon out of sight of the ranch buildings, but they were not afraid, as they knew by going to a high part of the prairie they could see their way back home--or they thought they could. There were no woods around them, though there were trees and a little stream of water farther off.

Suddenly, as the Curlytops were walking along together, they came to a place where there were a lot of rocks piled up in a sort of shelter.

Indeed one place looked as though it might be a cave. And as Teddy and Janet were looking at this they heard a strange noise, which came from among the rocks.

Both children stopped and stood perfectly still for a moment.

"Did you hear that?" asked Jan, clasping her brother's arm.

"Yes--I did," he answered.

"Did--did it sound like some one groaning?" she went on.

Teddy nodded his head to show that it had sounded that way to him. Just then the noise came again.

"Oh!" exclaimed Janet, starting to run. "Maybe it's an Indian! Oh, Teddy, come on!"

CHAPTER IX

THE SICK PONY

Teddy Martin did not run away as Jan started to leave the pile of rocks from which the queer sound had come. Instead he stood still and looked as hard as he could toward the hole among the stones--a hole that looked a little like the cave on Star Island, but not so large.

"Come on, Teddy!" begged Janet. "Please come!"

"I want to see what it is," he answered.

"Maybe it's something that--that'll bite you," suggested the little girl. "Come on!"

Just then the noise sounded again. It certainly was a groan.

"There!" exclaimed Janet. "I _know_ it's an Indian, Ted! Maybe it's one of the kind that took Uncle Frank's ponies. Oh, please come!"

She had run on a little way from the pile of rocks, but now she stood still, waiting for Teddy to follow.

"Come on!" she begged.

Janet did not want to go alone.

"It can't be an Indian," said Teddy, looking around but still not seeing anything to make that strange sound.

"It could so be an Indian!" declared Janet.

"Well, maybe a sick Indian," Teddy admitted. "And if he's as sick as all that I'm not afraid of him! I'm going to see what it is."

"Oh, The-o-dore Mar-tin!" cried Janet, much as she sometimes heard her mother use her brother's name. "Don't you dare!"

"Why not?" asked Teddy, who tried to speak very bravely, though he really did not feel brave. But he was not going to show that before Janet, who was a girl. "Why can't I see what that is?"

"'Cause maybe--maybe it'll--bite you!" and as Janet said this she looked first at the rocks and then over her shoulder, as though something might come up behind her when she least expected it.

"Pooh! I'm not afraid!" declared Teddy. "Anyhow, if it does bite me it's got to come out of the rocks first."

"Well, maybe it will come out."

"If it does I can see it and run!" went on the little boy.

"Would you run and leave me all alone?" asked Janet.

"Nope! Course I wouldn't do _that_," 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. But there was silence.

"Well, Henry Watson's got an awful big mouth," remarked Teddy. "Maybe he's wild, and that's the reason."

"He couldn't be an Indian, could he?" Janet went on.

"Course not!" declared her brother. "He's a boy, same as I am, only his mouth's bigger. That's why he bit me. I 'member it now."

"Did it hurt?" asked Janet.

"Yep," answered her brother. "But I'm going in there and see what that noise was. It won't hurt me."

Teddy began to feel that Janet was asking so many questions in order that he might forget all about what he intended to do. And he surely did want to see what was in among the rocks.

Once more he went closer to them, and then the noise sounded more loudly than before. It came so suddenly that Teddy and Janet jumped back, and there was no doubt but what they were both frightened.

"Oh, I'm not going to stay here another minute!" cried Janet. "Come on, Ted, let's go home!"