It was perhaps nearly a mile, and both the riders had searched
in all directions for some time before Gardley spied it. Eagerly he
seized upon the note, recognizing the little red manikin with which he
had whiled away an hour with Margaret during one of her visits at the
camp.

The note was written large and clear upon a sheet of writing-paper:

"I am Margaret Earle, school-teacher at Ashland. I am supposed to be
traveling to Walpi, by way of Keams, to meet Mr. and Mrs. Brownleigh of
Ganado. I am with an Indian, his squaw and papoose. The Indian said he
was sent to guide me, but he is drunk now and I am frightened. He has
acted strangely all the way. I do not know where I am. Please come and
help me."

Bud, sitting anxious like a statue upon his horse, read Gardley's face
as Gardley read the note. Then Gardley read it aloud to Bud, and before
the last word was fairly out of his mouth both man and boy started as if
they had heard Margaret's beloved voice calling them. It was not long
before Bud found another scrap of paper a half-mile farther on, and then
another and another, scattered at great distances along the way. The
only way they had of being sure she had dropped them was that they
seemed to be the same kind of paper as that upon which the note was
written.

How that note with its brave, frightened appeal wrung the heart of
Gardley as he thought of Margaret, unprotected, in terror and perhaps in
peril, riding on she knew not where. What trials and fears had she not
already passed through! What might she not be experiencing even now
while he searched for her?

It was perhaps two hours before he found the little white stocking
dropped where the trail divided, showing which way she had taken.
Gardley folded it reverently and put it in his pocket. An hour later Bud
pounced upon the bedroom slipper and carried it gleefully to Gardley;
and so by slow degrees, finding here and there a chessman or more paper,
they came at last to the camp where the Indians had abandoned their
trust and fled, leaving Margaret alone in the wilderness.

It was then that Gardley searched in vain for any further clue, and,
riding wide in every direction, stopped and called her name again and
again, while the sun grew lower and lower and shadows crept in
lurking-places waiting for the swift-coming night. It was then that Bud,
flying frantically from one spot to another, got down upon his knees
behind a sage-bush when Gardley was not look