, and then I was lifted down off
the horse and given to a squaw."

Teddy simply had to ask some questions now.

"A squaw is a Indian lady, isn't she?"

"Yes," answered Baldy, "that's what she is."

"Well, I shouldn't think she'd want to take you," went on the little
boy. "I thought the Indian men always kept the prisoners, and you were a
prisoner, weren't you?"

"Yes," answered Baldy, and there was a queer smile on his face, "but I
guess I forgot to tell you that the time I was captured by the Indians
I was a little boy, not as big as you, Curlytop. And the reason they
picked me up off the prairie was that I had wandered away from my home
and was lost. So the nice squaw kept me until one of the Indian men had
time to take me home."

"Then didn't the Indians hurt you?" asked Janet.

"Not a bit. They were very good to me," the cowboy said. "Some of them
knew my father and mother. That's the only time I was ever captured by
the Indians, and I'm afraid it wasn't very much of a story."

"Oh, it was _very_ nice," said Teddy politely.

"And not a bit scary, except a little teeny bit at first," added Janet.
"Can you tell us another, Mr. Baldy?"

"Well, I guess I can," said the good-natured cowboy. So he told other
tales of what had happened to him on the prairies, for he had lived in
the West all his life, and knew much about it.

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.

It was still morning, the cowboys having ridden away before dinner. They
had taken with them enough to eat, even if they had to stay out all
night.

"I wants a wide!" announced Trouble, when his brother and sister came in
to get him.

"Could we give him a little ride on our ponies?" asked Teddy of his
mother.

"Yes, I think so. But don't go far away from the stable. Are any of the
cowboys out there to help you saddle?"

Saddling, which meant buckling the leather seat tightly around the pony,
was something Teddy and Janet could not yet do very well for themselves.
It takes strong fingers to tighten the straps.

"Yes, Baldy is out there," Janet said.

"How often have I told you not to call the m