ot 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.

"I'll 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 we'll 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